Ms. Curell serves as president of the University of Chicago Medical Center and UChicago Medicine Crown Point, while concurrently holding the roles of executive vice president and system COO. In these combined roles, she is responsible for more than 14,000 employees and 2,400 clinicians across the system’s hospitals, clinics and physician practices in Chicago, its suburbs and Northwest Indiana. She has spent 25 years at UChicago Medicine, advancing through senior roles in risk management, compliance, integration and system operations before her appointment as medical center president in late 2025. The medical center holds 28 consecutive Leapfrog Hospital Safety Grade “A” ratings, making it the only hospital in Chicago and the only research-intensive academic medical center nationally with a perfect record since the program began in 2012, and received its eighth Leapfrog “Top Teaching Hospital” designation in December 2025. It ranks among only 28 hospitals nationwide listed in 10 or more specialties on U.S. News & World Report‘s 2025-26 “Best Hospitals” list, with the cancer program ranked No. 12 nationally. She is overseeing the development of a 575,000-square-foot cancer pavilion opening in 2027, the Chicago region’s first freestanding cancer facility, and in 2024 helped open UChicago Medicine Crown Point as the system’s largest facility outside its Hyde Park campus. A licensed attorney and registered nurse, Ms. Curell has been recognized as a 2024 “Daniel Burnham Fellow” by Leadership Greater Chicago and as a “Notable Woman in Health Care” by Crain’s Chicago Business.
