Tanner Wright, MD

Dr. Wright is a physician-scientist who works as a neonatal hospitalist and the medical director of the PEDI Clinic (Promoting Early Developmental Interventions) at Mary Lee’s House. His research is focused on improving care for infants with neonatal opioid withdrawal syndrome (NOWS) and supporting families impacted by substance use. Since completing his training, he has led and contributed to a wide range of federally funded, hypothesis-driven studies aimed at improving outcomes for maternal-infant dyads. His clinical work through the PEDI Clinic at the University of South Florida (USF)—which provides longitudinal care from pregnancy through early childhood—has been nationally recognized with the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) Model Practice of Excellence Award. In parallel, Dr. Wright serves as a trusted subject matter expert, having contributed to national and international panels, including the AAP’s Maternal-Infant Health and Opioid Use Learning Collaborative and the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime for in-utero exposure to synthetic opioids.  Dr. Wright has held leadership roles in several major research networks. He serves as site PI for the CDC-funded MAT-LINK surveillance project, a network for tracking data and outcomes related to opioid use disorder, polysubstance use, and infections like cytomegalovirus in pregnant people and their infants across the U.S. Since 2020, he has also contributed as site PI to the NIH-funded ACT NOW initiatives, which supports a series of clinical trials for infants with prenatal opioid exposure. His other research includes studies on the Eat, Sleep, Console model, infants with in-utero exposure to synthetic opioids, dosing protocols for NOWS, adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) in opioid-affected pregnancies, and the NIH-funded CADENCE program, which uses interactive data dashboards and data extraction to drive continuous quality improvement in maternal and infant care for families impacted by substance use. Dr. Wright has published multiple peer-reviewed studies on substance exposure in pregnancy and neonatal outcomes, reinforcing his role as a national leader in this field.