Dr. Alisa Haushalter is Associate Professor in the Department of Population and Community Health at the University of Tennessee Health Science Center’s College of Nursing, where she earned a Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) degree with a specialty in public health leadership in 2007. 

She earned a Master of Science in Nursing from Vanderbilt University in 1997 and an Associate’s degree in Nursing from Belmont University in 1982. Dr. Haushalter is certified as an Advanced Public Health Nurse.

With nearly 40 years of public health experience, Dr. Haushalter has dedicated her career to creating conditions that promote health and well-being for all people. From 2016 until 2021, Dr. Haushalter served as Director of the Shelby County Health Department in Memphis/Shelby County, where she led the county’s public health response to the COVID-19 pandemic. During her leadership, the department also met other challenges successfully: responding to an unknown source measles outbreak, containing the cases to seven; responding rapidly to Zika, preventing introduction into the local community; and developing two large capital projects, including a new customer-centered public health department.

From 2012 to 2016, she served as project director for Nemours $3.9 million-dollar Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation Award, improving outcomes for children with asthma in Delaware while reducing overall costs of care.

From 1983 to 2013, Dr. Haushalter served in a variety of roles in the Metro Public Health Department of Nashville/Davidson County, beginning her career as a district nurse and retiring as a bureau director with clinical and administrative responsibility for the Department’s population-based divisions.

Dr. Haushalter is an alumna of the 2018 Leadership Memphis Executive Program and the National League of Cities Mayor’s Institute on Housing, Health and Hazards. She was also a 2002-2003 Southeast Public Health Leadership Fellow.

Recognized for her nursing leadership, Dr. Haushalter is the recipient of multiple awards including the Public Relations Society of America, Memphis Chapter, 2020 Communicator of the Year; 2020 Health Care Heroes Recognition; 2020 Duck Walk of Fame Honoree; the 2017 John W. Runyan, Jr. Community Nursing Award; and the 2014 Nemours Transformational Nursing Leader Award. In 2012, she received the Middle Tennessee March of Dimes Public Health Nurse of the Year Award. She was also honored to be among the American Heart Association 2021 Inaugural Women of Impact cohort.