Nat Rivera

Nat Rivera is the Quality & Compliance Manager for NMDS. She was born and raised in Albuquerque, New Mexico where she routinely placed in her school science fairs and competed at Regionals. Nat was initially inspired to be a dentist, but Nat thrived in environmental science courses, particularly entomology. Nat spent her college summers working for the top breast cancer surgeon in New Mexico which helped refocus Nat's love of medicine and healthcare.

Nat then went on to work in human plasma donation for 12 years as a manager in Operations, Regulatory Affairs, and Quality Assurance/Compliance. Nat has been twice certified by the American Society for Quality and won numerous awards for her quality achievements in the plasma industry. She loves using research, data, systematic processes, analytical reasoning, problem solving and root cause analysis, every day.

Organ and tissue donation is close to Nat's heart, she has loved ones who are donor heroes and is a registered donor herself. Opportunity came for Nat to pursue her dream job as Quality Manager at NMDS in August 2025. Now, Nat works to ensure that organ/tissue donation in the state of New Mexico is of the highest caliber and is effective in save and improving the most lives possible.