Mary Decker Staples is an Executive with Howard University Hospital in Washington, DC. Prior to returning to health care she was owner of LearnAbility, an education service for students and their families. LearnAbility, based in Houston, Texas provided tutoring, study skills, parent coaching and intensive supervised academic services.

Mary Decker Staples had been a health care executive from 1976-2002. She was President of Partners in Performance, a consulting firm that specializes in healthcare safety and redesign for patient-centered care. She was with the University of Texas Medical Branch (UTMB) at Galveston from 1995 - 2002. Prior to UTMB, she was with the University of Michigan Hospitals in Ann Arbor (1986-1995), and Trinity Health in Detroit. Mary earned a BA at the University of Michigan in 1972 and received her MBA from Eastern Michigan University in 1976.

In 1992 and 1993 Mary was a finalist for the USAToday /RIT Quality Cup for an improvement team, which she led, and for a team she participated in. She participated in the National Demonstration Project for the Application of Total Quality to Healthcare from 1986-1988, leading the first quality improvement team at the University of Michigan Hospitals.

Mary lives in Silver Spring, Maryland. Mary loves to cook and is an avid reader of murder mysteries.