Dr. Stephanie Ahmed is a nationally recognized nurse leader with expertise in Watson's Human Caring Theory and Levinasian Ethics. Seeking to influence the patient's experience of care, Ahmed completed a post-doctoral fellowship with world-renowned nurse theorist, Jean Watson, PhD, RN, AHN-BC, FAAN. A nurse practitioner, Ahmed coordinated the complex care of the nation's first partial face transplant at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston, Massachusetts. This experience drew her to Watson's Theory of Human Caring and the work of French philosopher Emmanuel Levinas, the "Ethic of Face" and the "Ethic of Belonging". Recognizing Levinasian ethics as a means of illuminating the predicament of populations unseen within the US healthcare system and throughout broader society deeply influenced her thinking. Inspired to improve conditions for the marginalized and to advance healthy communities, Ahmed frames contemporary ethical, moral and social dilemmas through a Unitary Caring Science lens. Applying Levinasian concepts of alterity (the other) and rapport de face à face (the face-to-face encounter), she seeks to illuminate the faces and voices of those labeled as "Other", as a means of advancing belonging through understanding and inclusion.

An innovator and entrepreneur, Ahmed is the president of APEX-Rx Nursing Excellence Solutions and an independent nursing excellence consultant. She has held a variety of clinical and leadership roles from the bedside to the board room, including Health System Associate Chief Nurse Executive, and Executive Director for Clinical Effectiveness. Employed for over two decades at Massachusetts General Hospital and Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston, her experiences, from academic medical centers to community hospitals, and health centers to prison infirmaries have fostered within her a profound concern for humanity and a depth of expertise that transcends practice settings, roles, and specialties.