HCA student nominated for Women in Tech award

Monday, December 8, 2025

Media Contact: Sara Plummer | Senior Communications Coordinator | 918-561-1282 | sara.plummer@okstate.edu

Durga Chavali, a doctoral candidate in the Health Care Administration program at Oklahoma State University Center for Health Sciences, continues to garner accolades and recognition for her work in the field of health care technology.

This year Chavali, senior information technology leader at Trinity Health in Michigan, was featured in the publications “Tech Times” and “Digital First Magazine” for her work in using analytics and artificial intelligence in the health care technology industry. 

She’s also been invited to serve on the editorial board of the Association of Computing Machinery Ubiquity Magazine and served as a reviewer and judge for multiple health care and AI journals.

Chavali, who has 18 years of experience in health care IT, was most recently nominated for the Women in Tech Community Award as part of the Women In Tech Global Awards 2025. 

“I was deeply honored and humbled. The nomination felt like recognition not only of my individual contributions, but of the teams, collaborators and mentors who helped me advance health care technology,” she said. “It also reinforced the importance of visibility and mentorship for women and underrepresented professionals in tech leadership.”

At Trinity Health, Chavali oversees cross-functional teams and vendor partnerships that deliver large-scale data platforms. She also works with AI-enabled clinical and operational solutions as well as patient and provider experience. 

“In this role, I bridge clinical, operational and technical leadership to ensure technology initiatives drive measurable improvements in care, compliance and value-based outcomes,” she said.

Even with her years of experience in health care technology, Chavali said she wanted to pursue master’s and doctorate degrees in health care administration to gain more knowledge about policy, finance and strategy to better equip her for leadership roles.

She learned about the Health Care Administration program at OSU-CHS through professional networks and colleagues who highlighted the program’s focus on applied leadership and health care strategy.

“My experience has been transformative. The program’s applied curriculum has sharpened my ability to evaluate trade-offs, craft sustainable digital health strategies and lead cross-disciplinary teams,” she said. “The cohort environment and faculty mentorship have been especially valuable. They have helped me translate academic insights directly into operational improvements and governance frameworks at Trinity Health.”

Chavali is driven to improve the experiences of both patients and providers through technology, which she believes can humanize care rather than dehumanize it.

“Technology should reduce friction, restore clinician time for care, and make care more accessible and precise for patients,” she said. “I am passionate about solutions that free clinicians from administrative burden, provide patients with timely and personalized information, and offer actionable insights that improve outcomes.”