Dr. Lela Tsakadze
Dr. Lela Tsakadze is a highly qualified medical professional with extensive experience in clinical practice, health administration, and medical education.
Since 2026, Dr. Tsakadze has served as a Clinical Surveyor at the Healthcare Quality Accreditation Council, where she oversees clinical governance, patient safety, epidemiology, infection prevention and control, and clinical risk management within the accreditation processes of healthcare organizations.
Since 2023, she has gained experience working with international accreditation organizations in the healthcare field.
Since February 2019, she has been serving as Quality and Patient Safety Director at M. Iashvili Children's Hospital.
In 2018, she participated in the IPC National Survey in collaboration with CDC and ICAP assessment teams.
In 2017, she served as a member of the Technical Working Group on the development of National Guidelines on Infection Prevention and Control, under a grant funded by the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (USA CDC), entitled "Protecting and Improving Public Health Globally: Building and Strengthening Public Health Impact."
From 2015 to 2019, she worked as Chief Epidemiologist at EVEX Medical Corporation.
Additionally, in 2017 she successfully completed a management course at the Bank of Georgia University.
Since February 2016, she has been a lecturer at DTMU Nursing College, Tbilisi, Georgia, where she teaches Infection Prevention and Control and Microbiology.
From 2013 to 2015, she completed the South Caucasus Field Epidemiology and Laboratory Training Program (SC-FELTP, Cohort 5). During her training, Dr. Tsakadze participated in numerous projects as principal investigator and conducted several field studies. She gained substantial experience in fieldwork and data analysis, as well as the ability to translate research findings into practical public health action.
Shortly thereafter, she received specialized IPC training provided by a US-CDC consultant and became an IPC trainer for the EVEX network. Dr. Tsakadze was instrumental in establishing surveillance systems for Healthcare-Associated Infections and strengthening IPC practices across multiple clinical settings.
From 2015 to 2023, Dr. Tsakadze represented non-governmental organizations in the TB Elimination Team of the Country Coordination Mechanism (CCM), established in 2003 to coordinate and monitor HIV/AIDS, TB, and Malaria projects funded by the Global Fund and other international organizations. She has also been a member of the Epidemiological Technical Working Group of the AMR Committee of the Ministry of Health since 2018.
From 2014 to 2015, she served as a TB Expert and Appraiser for the USAID Georgia TB Prevention Project, where she was responsible for the performance appraisal of trained Family Physicians and Nurses.
From 1995 to 2015, Dr. Tsakadze worked as a TB Physician in the MD/XDR-TB Department at the National Center for Tuberculosis and Lung Diseases, Tbilisi, Georgia, accumulating twenty years of specialized clinical experience in the diagnosis and management of tuberculosis, including multidrug-resistant and extensively drug-resistant forms of the disease.
Dr. Tsakadze holds an MD degree from Tbilisi State Medical University and a State Certificate in Pulmonology and Phthisiatry. She is currently a PhD Candidate in the Faculty of Medicine Educational PhD Program in Medicine at Tbilisi State Medical University.