Merlyn LaPaix, RN, MSN, MBA, LNC

Associate

Merlyn V. LaPaix, RN, MSN, MBA, LNC has more than 40 years of healthcare experience including upper-level management and executive leadership.  She is recognized for her extensive and effective work in patient safety and nursing leadership and is qualified in managing hospital, long term care, and behavioral health care services. 

Ms. LaPaix joined the Barrins team after a serving as a Nurse Consultant for several years at Joint Commission Resources.  While with JCR, she was responsible for conducting mock surveys and reviewing/developing policies for Behavioral Hospitals, Outpatient, and Residential settings, as well as Addiction and Seizure Management areas.  Ms. LaPaix also conducted educational sessions about Suicide and Restraints and would visit Acute Care Hospitals to survey their Emergency areas and to interview staff members’ interpretation and knowledge of safe areas as it related to suicide prevention.

Prior to working for Joint Commission Resources, Ms. LaPaix served as the Director of Psychiatric Nursing at Yale New Haven Hospital in New Haven, CT. During her tenure, she was responsible for financial program management of five inpatient units and the psychiatric observation unit. She spearheaded a 75% reduction shift in culture away from the usage of restraints and toward other less restrictive interventions, and she played an integral part in the creation of a fully staffed, 24/7 Psychiatric Observation Unit that effectively reduced Emergency Department wait times and dramatically improved patients’ connection to ambulatory care.

Other notable industry experience includes Associate Director of Psychiatric Nursing at Kings County Hospital in Brooklyn, NY; Associate Director of Ambulatory Care at Metropolitan Hospital in Manhattan, NY; Clinical Director at Bergen Regional Medical Center in Paramus, NJ; Director of Nursing at Delaware Psychiatric Center; Chief Nursing Officer at Bergen Regional, and Vice President of Acute and Ambulatory at Bergen Regional.

Ms. LaPaix is a distinguished presenter and in 2015 led a global audience at the American College of Health Care Executives Congress on Healthcare Leadership in Chicago, IL on the “Successful Integration of Behavioral Health Services in a Hospital Setting.”  She has presented to The American Hospital Association for Behavioral Health Hospitals on the same topic of integrating services between settings.  Ms. LaPaix is also an author on “Preventing Patient Suicide.”