Marion Leary: The Creative Future of Nursing
When Marion Leary had her breakthrough moment at the Philadelphia Science Festival, staring at a virtual reality booth, she realized something that would reshape her entire career: the creative tools from design and technology could revolutionize how we teach people to save lives.
Marion Leary, PhD, MPH, RN is the Director of Innovation at the University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing, where she's on a mission to help every nurse recognize what she discovered during her own winding journey: that nurses are natural innovators who belong at the center of healthcare transformation, not on its sidelines.
Marion's path to becoming nursing's creativity champion was anything but linear. After enduring bullying in Catholic school and playing professional women's football for the New York Sharks, she found her calling through a chance encounter with a nurse while working in an HIV/AIDS residential program in Boston. That meeting revealed a profession she'd never seen on TV—one of autonomy, creativity, and endless possibilities. As a first-generation college graduate, Marion earned her nursing degree from Thomas Jefferson University, then dove into resuscitation science research at Penn, spending 12 years developing innovations like CPReality, a holographic augmented reality system that lets CPR trainees literally see blood flowing through a patient's circulatory system as they perform compressions. But it was while creating these lifesaving technologies that Marion had her breakthrough realization: nurses were already innovating constantly on hospital floors, they just didn't recognize it or have the frameworks to lead with those innovations.
In 2019, Marion became Penn Nursing's first Director of Innovation, and she immediately started building what she calls an "ecosystem" for nurse-led creativity. She teaches "Innovation in Health"—an interdisciplinary design thinking course where nursing students team up with engineers, designers, and business students to prototype solutions for real-world health challenges. She leads the Johnson & Johnson Nurse Innovation Fellowship, a national program that equips Chief Nursing Officers and senior nurse leaders with human-centered design methodologies and business acumen through Penn Nursing and Wharton School. She's a founding member and Research Council member of SONSIEL (Society of Nurse Scientists, Innovators, Entrepreneurs and Leaders), a global network of 600+ nurse innovators across 17 countries that hosts NurseHack4Health competitions awarding hundreds of thousands in funding to nurse-led solutions.
But Marion's most creative moves happen at the intersections others overlook. She co-hosts two influential podcasts—Amplify Nursing with Dr. Angelarosa DiDonato and Love n' Leary with Rebecca Love—amplifying nurse voices from Congress to courtrooms to startups. She created Penn Nursing's Story Slam, where nurses learn storytelling craft and perform personal narratives, because she believes stories are essential innovation tools. She's worked with improv comedy theaters to communicate research. She built a free, open-access Design Thinking for Health platform so nurses worldwide can learn innovation methodologies. She's co-President of the Nursing is STEM Board, advocating for nursing's recognition as a STEM field, and recently received a Fulbright Award for her project "Creating a Nursing Innovation Ecosystem."
Marion lives with a severe shellfish allergy that causes reactions even from inhalation, turning every conference, flight, and restaurant visit into careful navigation. Rather than hiding this invisible disability, she writes openly about it, advocating for the millions of adults with food allergies who face dismissal and misunderstanding. This vulnerability—alongside her identity as an openly gay woman, married mother, and LGBTQ+ advocate—shapes her human-centered approach to everything she creates.
Her philosophy is radically democratizing: "You don't have to go into a nursing innovation role to be a nurse innovator. You take the skills that you learn and you apply them to wherever you're practicing." She sees nurses as "one of the great untapped resources in health care innovation" who "interact with every product or process that touches a patient." For Marion, creativity isn't about genius breakthroughs—it's about giving nurses the permission, tools, and confidence to lead the changes they're already imagining.
From holographic CPR training to hackathons to storytelling workshops, Marion Leary is proving that the future of healthcare innovation isn't just interdisciplinary—it's nurse-led, human-centered, and grounded in the creative problem-solving that happens every day at the bedside. She's not just teaching design thinking; she's redesigning what nursing can be.
Sources & Citations
University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing - Marion Leary Faculty Profile
https://www.nursing.upenn.edu/live/profiles/15683-marion-leary
Marion's official faculty page at Penn Nursing, detailing her role as Director of Innovation, her research interests in human-centered design and innovation methodology, courses taught, and publications.
Wikipedia - Marion Leary
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marion_Leary
Comprehensive biographical overview covering Marion's education, career trajectory from resuscitation science to innovation leadership, her founding role in SONSIEL, and major accomplishments, including CPReality development.
Technical.ly - "How I Got Here: Marion Leary wants her nursing colleagues to know they, too, can have a career in tech"
https://technical.ly/professional-development/marion-leary-nurse-led-innovation/
In-depth profile exploring Marion's personal journey from professional women's football player to nurse innovator, her work building nursing innovation ecosystems, and her philosophy that nurses are "one of the great untapped resources in health care innovation."
Penn Center for Innovation - "Marion Leary Speaks on her Innovation-Focused Nursing Career"
https://pci.upenn.edu/marion-leary-speaks-on-her-innovation-focused-nursing-career/
Interview discussing Marion's transition from clinical research to innovation leadership, her creation of Penn Nursing's innovation infrastructure, and her vision for democratizing design thinking in healthcare.
University of Pennsylvania Almanac - "Marion Leary: Penn Nursing's First Director of Innovation"
https://almanac.upenn.edu/articles/marion-leary-penn-nursings-first-director-of-innovation
Announcement and feature on Marion's historic appointment as Penn Nursing's inaugural Director of Innovation in 2019, outlining her vision for building a nurse innovation ecosystem.
Johnson & Johnson Nursing - "Driving Innovation, Ideation and Collaboration at Penn Nursing"
https://nursing.jnj.com/nursing-news-events/nurses-leading-innovation/driving-innovation-ideation-and-collaboration-at-penn-nursing
Details about Marion's leadership of the Johnson & Johnson Nurse Innovation Fellowship program and her work training senior nurse leaders in human-centered design methodologies.
Mothers in Science - Marion Leary Profile
https://www.mothersinscience.com/journeys/marion-leary
Personal narrative covering Marion's experience balancing motherhood with her career in nursing innovation, including insights into her educational background and professional development.
Women's Media Center SheSource - Marion Leary Expert Profile
https://womensmediacenter.com/shesource/expert/marion-leary-msn-mph-rn-faha
Expert directory listing highlighting Marion's credentials, areas of expertise including healthcare innovation and LGBTQ+ health advocacy, and media availability.
American Nurse Journal - "Storytelling and its application to health, nursing and healthcare"
https://www.myamericannurse.com/applying-storytelling-to-health-and-healthcare/
Article featuring Marion's innovative work with Penn Nursing's Story Slam and her philosophy on using narrative and storytelling as essential tools for healthcare innovation and communication.
Marion Leary on Medium - "Hello I'm an Adult and I too have a Food Allergy"
https://marionleary.medium.com/hello-im-an-adult-and-i-too-have-a-food-allergy-16deaee50fa3
Marion's personal essay about living with a severe inhalation shellfish allergy, advocating for adult food allergy awareness and better accommodations in professional and travel settings.
SONSIEL - THInC Conference
https://www.sonsiel.org/thinc2025
Information about the Society of Nurse Scientists, Innovators, Entrepreneurs and Leaders (SONSIEL), the organization Marion co-founded to connect and support nurse innovators globally.