Martha Shepherd, DO, MPH, FAAFP, FACLM

Martha E. Shepherd, DO, MPH, FAAFP, FACLM, is an Associate Professor of Clinical Medicine in the Department of Medicine’s Division of General Internal Medicine and Public Health. She is triple board certified in family medicine, integrative medicine and lifestyle medicine, and holds a Master of Public Health from Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth College. She is a fellow of the American Academy of Family Physicians and the American College of Lifestyle Medicine.

Dr. Shepherd completed medical school at Kansas City University, followed by a family medicine internship at Naval Hospital Jacksonville, a residency at the University of Tennessee, and a fellowship in integrative medicine at The University of Arizona. She is a certified yoga instructor, and a certified Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) teacher through the Mindfulness Center at Brown University School of Public Health. She joined the Vanderbilt faculty after serving as a medical officer in the United States Navy. She sits on the board of the Tennessee Academy of Family Physicians and is co-chair of the Tennessee Medical Association education committee.

Dr. Shepherd’s research involves employer health and best practices in population health, including two clinical trials investigating mindfulness in medicine (NCT03571386, NCT05051969 (PI)). Her work stresses the importance of effective health communication and including patients in their care plan using shared decision-making tools and evidence-based clinical care paths. She is particularly interested in leveraging technology to improve quality of care while enhancing the patient and provider experience. She has been an invited speaker locally, nationally and internationally at academic institutions, corporate health events and scientific meetings.

Dr. Shepherd is the Chief Medical Officer for the Metro Nashville Public Schools (MNPS) Teacher Health Plan and the Medical Director for Vanderbilt Health at MNPS, a network of five award-winning employer-based clinics with an interdisciplinary team dedicated to delivering whole-person care to MNPS employees. She is active in the employer health space, serving on the Medical Director Council for the National Association of Worksite Health Centers (NAWHC), the Physician Advisory Council for Cigna, and as a board member for the Health Enhancement Research Organization (HERO).