Partners HealthCare
Center of Expertise in Health Policy
Faculty Bios
Health Policy Center of Expertise Faculty
Joseph R. Betancourt, M.D., M.P.H.
Director, The Disparities Solutions Center
Senior Scientist, The Institute for Health Policy
Director of Multicultural Education, Mass General Hospital
Assistant Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School
Dr. Betancourt’s interests include cross-cultural medicine, minority recruitment into
the health professions, and minority health and health policy research. He has
served as principal or co-investigator on grants from the Centers for Medicare and
Medicaid Services, the Health Resources and Services Administration, The Robert
Wood Johnson Foundation, The California Endowment, and the Commonwealth
Fund. He is also on several Institute of Medicine committees, including those that
produced Unequal Treatment and Guidance for a National Health Care Disparities
Report. He co-chairs the MGH Committee on Racial and Ethnic Disparities, has
served on the Massachusetts State Disparities Committee and co-chaired the Boston
Public Health Commission's Disparities Subcommittee on Quality Improvement. Dr.
Betancourt works with federal, state and local government, foundations, health
plans, hospitals, health centers, professional societies, pharmacy, and private
industry to identify strategies to improve quality of care and eliminate racial and
ethnic disparities.
Timothy G. Ferris, MD, MPH
Medical Director, Mass General Physicians Organization
Dr. Ferris is a practicing general internist and pediatrician and the medical director
of the Mass General Physicians Organization. He is formally the Vice Chair for
Quality for Partners Pediatrics and Mass General Hospital for Children. He is also a
Senior Scientist in the Partners/MGH Institute for Health Policy and an Associate
Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School. His research has focused on the
measurement and improvement of health care quality for adults and children,
particularly focused on the roles of financing and health information technology. In
addition to quality improvement interventions he has published studies on the
effects of the organization and financing of care on the costs and quality of care, risk
adjustment of quality measures, and disparities in health care. He has over 50
publications including those in journals such as the New England Journal of
Medicine, JAMA, Pediatrics, and Health Affairs. Dr. Ferris has been leading efforts at
Partners Healthcare to improve the care of patients with multiple chronic
conditions with specific responsibility for design, oversight and evaluation of
programs to improve quality and efficiency of care for high-risk patients such as
those with heart failure.
Dr. Ferris has been a member of the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality’s
Health Care Quality and Effectiveness Research study section, has chaired two
Technical Advisory Panels for the National Quality Forum, sits on the Quality and
Safety subcommittee to the Board of the National Association of Children’s Hospitals
and Related Institutions (NACHRI), and consulted to the World Health Organization.
Atul Gawande, MD, MPH
A surgeon and a writer, Dr. Gawande is a staff member of Brigham and Women's
Hospital, the Dana Farber Cancer Institute, and the New Yorker magazine. He
received his B.A.S. from Stanford University, M.A. (in politics, philosophy, and
economics) from Oxford University, M.D. from Harvard Medical School, and M.P.H.
from the Harvard School of Public Health. He served as a senior health policy
advisor in the Clinton presidential campaign and White House from 1992 to 1993.
Since 1998, he has been a staff writer for the New Yorker magazine. In 2003, he
completed his surgical residency at Brigham and Women's Hospital, Boston, and
joined the faculty as a general and endocrine surgeon. He is also Associate Professor
of Surgery at Harvard Medical School, Associate Professor in the Department of
Health Policy and Management at the Harvard School of Public Health, and Associate
Director for the BWH Center for Surgery and Public Health. He has published
research studies in areas ranging from surgical technique, to US military care for the
wounded, to error and performance in medicine. He is the director of the World
Health Organization's Global Challenge for Safer Surgical Care.
In 2006, he received the MacArthur Award for his research and writing. His
nonfiction writing has been selected to appear in the annual Best American Essays
collection twice and in Best American Science Writing five of the last six years. His
book COMPLICATIONS: A SURGEON'S NOTES ON AN IMPERFECT SCIENCE was a
finalist for the National Book Award in 2002 and is published in more than a
hundred countries. He is editor of THE BEST AMERICAN SCIENCE WRITING 2006.
His most recent book, BETTER: A SURGEON'S NOTES ON PERFORMANCE was
selected as one of Amazon.com's ten best books of 2007.
Gary Gottlieb, MD, MBA
Dr. Gottlieb serves as President and CEO of Partners HealthCare, assuming the
position on January 4, 2010. Dr. Gottlieb comes to this role with a deep and rich
history with Partners. He served as President of Brigham and Women’s/ Faulkner
Hospitals since March of 2002. He is also a Professor of Psychiatry at Harvard
Medical School.
Dr. Gottlieb was recruited by Partners to become the first chairman of Partners
Psychiatry in 1998 and he served in that capacity through 2005. In 2000, he added
the role of President of the North Shore Medical Center where he served until early
2002.
Prior to coming to Boston, Dr. Gottlieb spent 15 years in positions of increasing
leadership in health care in Philadelphia. In 1983, he arrived at the University of
Pennsylvania as a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Clinical Scholar. Through that
program, he earned an M.B.A with Distinction in Health Care Administration from
Penn’s Wharton Graduate School of Business Administration. He credits the
program with building a foundation of interest in health policy, management and
academic leadership.
Dr. Gottlieb went on to establish Penn Medical Center’s first program in geriatric
psychiatry and developed it into a nationally recognized research, training and
clinical program. Dr. Gottlieb rose to become Executive Vice-Chair and Interim Chair
of Penn’s Department of Psychiatry and the Health System’s Associate Dean for
Managed Care. In 1994, he became Director and Chief Executive Officer of Friends
Hospital in Philadelphia, the nation’s oldest, independent, freestanding psychiatric
hospital.
In addition to his noteworthy academic, clinical and management record, Dr.
Gottlieb has published extensively in geriatric psychiatry and health care policy. He
is a past President of the American Association of Geriatric Psychiatry. Dr. Gottlieb
received his BS cum laude from the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and his M.D.
from the Albany Medical College of Union University in a six-year accelerated
biomedical program. He completed his internship and residency and served as Chief
Resident at New York University/Bellevue Medical Center.
Now, as a recognized community leader in Boston, Dr. Gottlieb also focuses his
attention on workforce development and disparities in health care. He was
appointed by Mayor Thomas Menino as Chairman of the Private Industry Council,
the City’s workforce development board, which partners with education, labor,
higher education, the community and government, to provide oversight and
leadership to public and private workforce development programs. In 2004-2005,
he served as co-chair of the Mayor’s Task Force to Eliminate Health Disparities.
Dr. Gottlieb believes Partners HealthCare mission is its compass – to inspire, to
nurture, to challenge the best and the brightest to step forward and care for the
sickest and neediest in our community and around world.
John Hsu, MD, MBA, MSCE
Lecturer in Medicine, Harvard Medical School
Dr. Hsu is the director of the Program for Clinical Economics and Policy Analysis
within the Mongan Institute for Health Policy, which he joined in January 2010. He
studies innovations in health care financing and delivery, and their effects on
medical quality and efficiency. With a background in internal medicine, health
services research and clinical epidemiology, and health care finance and
management, Dr. Hsu brings clinical, population, and business perspectives to these
studies. In his work, he primarily uses large automated and electronic health record
data sets, often exploiting natural experiments from both clinical and behavioral
economics perspectives. Dr. Hsu’s current work focuses on the interplay between
benefit design and delivery system integration. He has collaborated closely with
policy-makers and organizational decision-makers to help implement changes
based on his research findings.
In 1999, after completing his medical and post-graduate training at the University of
Pennsylvania, Dr. Hsu took a position at Kaiser Permanente in Oakland, CA, where most
recently he served as Director of the Center for Health Policy Studies, in the Division of
Research, Kaiser Permanente Medical Care Program. Since 2001, he has been continually
funded by multiple R01 grants (including from the Agency for Healthcare Research and
Quality [AHRQ], the National Institute on Aging, and National Institute of General
Medical Sciences), and grants supported by the Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention, The Commonwealth Fund, and the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission
(MedPAC), among other sources. His AHRQ grant R01 HS013902, “Prescription Drug
Cost-sharing: Effects on Affordability and Patient Safety,” was the best scored project at
AHRQ in 2003. One article from this drug cost-sharing study received Article-of-theYear awards from both AcademyHealth and the International Society of
Pharmacoeconomics and Outcomes Research in 2007. Dr. Hsu has given numerous
invited research and other presentations at national and international meetings, and to
public and private health care stakeholders.
Lisa I. Iezzoni, MD, MSc
Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School
Dr. Iezzoni has spent more than two decades conducting health services research
focusing on three primary areas: risk adjustment methods for predicting cost and
clinical outcomes of care; use of administrative data for assessing health care
quality; and health care experiences and outcomes of persons with disabilities.
After spending 16 years as Co-Director of Research in the Division of General
Medicine and Primary Care at Boston’s Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Dr.
Iezzoni joined the MIHP as Associate Director in 2006. She is currently serving as
Director of MIHP.
Dr. Iezzoni has led numerous research grants with funding from the Agency for
Healthcare Research and Quality, National Institutes of Health, the Health Care
Financing Administration, The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, and other private
foundations. An internationally recognized expert in risk adjustment, she has edited
Risk Adjustment for Measuring Health Care Outcomes, now in its third edition. Dr.
Iezzoni began her disability research with a 1996 Investigator Award in Health
Policy Research from RWJF, and the book summarizing this work, When Walking
Fails: Mobility Impairments of Adults with Chronic Conditions, appeared in 2003.
Another book considering disability experiences more broadly, More Than Ramps: A
Guide to Improving Health Care Quality and Access for People with Disabilities
(coauthored with Bonnie L. O’Day), was published in 2006. Dr. Iezzoni has also
published numerous original articles, editorials, and commentaries in major medical
and health services research journals.
Dr. Iezzoni speaks widely, and she has served on numerous committees and
advisory boards of professional and governmental organizations, including the
National Institutes of Health, the Institute of Medicine, the National Quality Forum,
and The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Clinical Scholars Program. For the U.S.
Department of Health and Human Services, she served on the National Committee
on Vital and Health Statistics (1994-2001) and Secretary's Advisory Committee on
Health Promotion and Disease Prevention Objectives for 2020 (2008-2009). She
has served on the editorial boards of the Annals of Internal Medicine, the Journal of
General Internal Medicine, Health Affairs, Medical Care, Health Services Research, and
the Disability and Health Journal, among others. In 2000, Dr. Iezzoni was elected to
the Institute of Medicine in the National Academy of Sciences.
Thomas H. Lee, MD MSC
Network President for Partners Healthcare System
Thomas H. Lee, MD, is an internist and cardiologist, and is Network President for
Partners Healthcare System, the integrated delivery system founded by Brigham
and Women’s Hospital and Massachusetts General Hospital, and Chief Executive
Officer for Partners Community HealthCare.
He is a graduate of Harvard College, Cornell University Medical College, and Harvard
School of Public Health. He is a Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School and
Professor of Health Policy and Management at the Harvard School of Public Health.
His research interests include risk stratification and optimal management strategies
for common cardiovascular problems, and improvement of quality of care, with a
particular focus on critical pathways, guideline development and implementation,
and managed care.
Dr. Lee is co-chair of the Committee for Performance Measures of the National
Committee for Quality Assurance (NCQA), and has been the Chairman of NCQA’s
Cardiovascular Measurement Advisory Panel since 1996. He is a member of the
Massachusetts Health Care Quality and Cost Council. He is a member of the Boards
of Directors of Geisinger Health System and of Bridges to Excellence. He is a member
of the Board on Health Care Services of the Institute of Medicine. He is the Editor-inChief for The Harvard Heart Letter and Associate Editor of The New England Journal
of Medicine.
Barbara J. McNeil, MD, MPH
Professor and founding head of the Department of Health Care Policy, HMS
Barbara J. McNeil, MD, PhD, is the Ridley Watts Professor and founding head of the
Department of Health Care Policy at Harvard Medical School. She is also a professor
of radiology at Harvard Medical School and at Brigham and Women’s Hospital.
Dr. McNeil’s research activities have focused on several areas, most notably
technology assessment and quality of care. Her most recent work includes two large
studies supported by the Department of Veterans Affairs. The first focused on a
comparison of quality of care for veterans with cardiac disease with the care
provided to Medicare beneficiaries seen in private settings. Its report led to the
introduction of many changes in the care of veterans with cardiac disease. As a
result of that study, she and her colleagues are currently performing a similar study
on cancer care; they will study patients with lung cancer, colon cancer, breast
cancer, prostate cancer, or several hematological malignancies. Dr. McNeil also
works closely with the national Blue Cross Blue Shield Association in several areas
related to the identification and dissemination of approaches to improving either
the quality or the efficiency of care in plans across the country.
Dr. McNeil received her AB degree from Emmanuel College, her MD from Harvard
Medical School, and her PhD from Harvard University. She is a member of the
Institute of Medicine (IOM) of the National Academy of Sciences (where she is chair
of its Board of Health Care Services) and the American Academy of Arts and
Sciences. Dr. McNeil is also a member of the Blue Cross Technology Evaluation
Commission (TEC), the Medicare Coverage Advisory Committee, and the Council for
Performance Measurement for the JCAHO. She recently began serving as chair of an
IOM committee on the identification of high clinical value services. Previously Dr.
McNeil served as a member of the Prospective Payment Assessment Commission
and the Publications Committee of the New England Journal of Medicine.
Gregg S. Meyer, MD, MSC
Senior Vice President for Quality and Patient Safety., MGH
Gregg S. Meyer, MD, MSc, is the Senior Vice President for Quality and Patient Safety
at the Massachusetts General Hospital and Massachusetts General Physicians
Organization. Prior to his new position, Dr. Meyer was the Medical Director of the
Massachusetts General Physicians Organization, the largest physician group practice
in New England. From 1998 to 2002 he served as Director of the Center for Quality
Improvement and Patient Safety at the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality
(AHRQ). Before his tenure at AHRQ, Dr. Meyer was on faculty at the Uniformed
Services University of the Health Sciences as an active duty Medical Corps officer
and Colonel in the United States Air Force. He has served on numerous key
committees related to quality and safety including the Joint Commission’s Board,
National Committee for Quality Assurance’s Committee on Performance
Measurement, the National Quality Forum’s Safe Practices Maintenance Committee,
the World Health Organization’s Scientific Peer Review Group on Health Systems
Performance Assessment, and NASA’s Medical Policy Board.
Dr. Meyer is a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Union College, magna cum laude graduate
of Albany Medical College, has a masters degree from the Harvard School of Public
Health, and was a Rhodes Scholar. He is a practicing general internist and completed
a residency in primary care
internal medicine at the Massachusetts General Hospital.
Elizabeth G. Nabel, MD
Dr. Nabel, MD, is the president of the Brigham and Women's/Faulkner Hospitals, a
position she assumed on Jan. 4, 2010. Prior to her position at BWH, Dr Nabel served
as the director of the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute at the National
Institutes of Health. In this capacity, Dr. Nabel oversaw an extensive national
research portfolio with an annual budget of approximately $3.0 billion to prevent,
diagnose, and treat heart, lung, and blood diseases. A native of St. Paul, Minnesota,
she attended Weill Cornell Medical College and conducted her internal medicine and
cardiovascular training at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School,
followed by faculty positions at the University of Michigan Medical School where she
directed the Division of Cardiology and the Cardiovascular Research Center.
As a physician-scientist, Dr. Nabel has made substantial contributions to our
understanding of molecular genetics of cardiovascular diseases. She has delineated
the mechanisms by which cell cycle and growth factor proteins regulate the
proliferation of vascular cells in blood vessels, a process important for the
development of atherosclerosis and other cardiovascular diseases. Her current work
has focused on the rare premature aging disorder, Hutchinson-Gilford Progeria
Syndrome, where she has characterized the smooth muscle cell defect leading to
premature heart attack and stroke in children in their early teens.
Among her leadership efforts as NHLBI director, Dr. Nabel launched new scientific
programs in genetics and genomics, stem and progenitor cell biology, translational
research, global health, and support for young investigators.
Her awards include the Willem Einthoven Award; the Amgen-Scientific Achievement
Award; the American Heart Association Distinguished Achievement Awards; the
Eugene Braunwald Academic Mentorship Award; the Distinguished Alumni Award
from Weill Cornell Medical College; the Lewis Katz Research Prize in Cardiovascular
Research and four honorary doctorates. She is a member of the American Academy
of the Arts and Sciences, the Institute of Medicine (Council) of the National Academy
of Sciences, the Association of American Physicians (Council), and a fellow of the
American Association for the Advancement of Science. Dr. Nabel has served on the
Board of Reviewing Editors for Science and currently is on the Editorial Board of the
New England Journal of Medicine and Science Translational Medicine. She is a
partner on 17 patents and the author of more than 250 scientific publications.
Dr. Nabel’s pledge is to strengthen the mission of the Brigham and
Women’s/Faulkner Hospitals and their connections to the people and the
communities that they serve, whether they live across street or around the world.
James M. Perrin, MD
Director, MGH Center for Child and Adolescent Health Policy
Director, Division of General Pediatrics, Vice Chair for Research
MassGeneral Hospital for Children
James M. Perrin, M.D., is professor of pediatrics at Harvard Medical School and
director of the Division of General Pediatrics and the Center for Child and
Adolescent Health Policy at the MassGeneral Hospital for Children, a research and
training center with an active fellowship program in general pediatrics. He currently
heads the MGH coordinating center for the Autism Treatment Network.
He chaired the American Academy of Pediatrics Committee on Children with
Disabilities and is past president of the Ambulatory Pediatric Association. For the
American Academy of Pediatrics, he also co-chaired a committee to develop practice
guidelines for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.
His research has examined asthma, middle ear disease, children’s hospitalization,
and childhood chronic illness and disabilities, with a recent emphasis on studies of
the Supplemental Security Income Program for children and adolescents and
primary and subspecialty care for children with chronic illness. Dr. Perrin is the
founding editor of Ambulatory Pediatrics, the journal of the Ambulatory Pediatric
Association. He served on the Institute of Medicine’s Committees on Maternal and
Child Health under Health Care Reform, Quality of Long-Term-Care Services in
Home and Community-Based Settings, Enhancing Federal Healthcare Quality
Programs, and Disability in America; the National Commission on Childhood
Disability, and the Disability Policy Panel of the National Academy of Social
Insurance (Chair, Children’s Committee).
He received a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Investigator Award in Health Policy
Research. He served as a member of the Health Care Technology study section of the
Agency for Health Care Policy and Research and of the National Advisory Council for
the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality.
Peter L. Slavin, MD
President, Massachusetts General Hospital
Peter L. Slavin, MD, has been the president of Massachusetts General Hospital since
2003. From 1999–2002, he served as chairman and chief executive officer of the
Massachusetts General Physicians Organization, which included over 1,700
physicians and employed nearly 1,000 of them.
From 1997–1999, Dr. Slavin served as president of Barnes-Jewish Hospital in St.
Louis, Miss. Before that, he did his training in internal medicine at Mass General
from 1984–1987 and was senior vice president and chief medical officer from
1994–1997.
Dr. Slavin graduated from Harvard College in 1979, Harvard Medical School in 1984
and Harvard Business School in 1990.
Dr. Slavin teaches internal medicine and health care management at Harvard
Medical School, where he is a professor of health care policy. He lectures widely on
topics including quality and utilization management, the economics of teaching
hospitals and the state of physician practices.
Allen Smith, MD, MS
Allen Smith is president of the Brigham and Women’s Physicians Organization
(BWPO), a faculty practice plan for over 1200 physicians. His chief responsibilities
include leadership of overall BWPO strategy and core functions as well as
BWH/BWPO network development. He is also involved in physician leadership
development, ambulatory improvement, contracting strategy, health care policy,
and physician work-life issues.
Prior to this Allen was Chief Medical Officer of BWPO, in which he led contracting,
pay for performance programs and was involved in network development and
leadership development. He has also served as Assistant Vice-President for Strategy
and Business Planning at Tufts Health Plan and medical director for Secure
Horizons, Tufts Health Plan for Seniors. Allen began his medical career as a
primary care physician at North Shore Medical Center for nearly 10 years and was
medical director of Lynnfield Medical Associates in Peabody, MA.
He has a BA from Dartmouth College, an MD from University of Massachusetts
Medical School, and a Masters in Science in Health Administration and Population
Health from University of Wisconsin in Madison. He is an Instructor in Medicine at
Harvard Medical School.
David F. Torchiana, M.D.
Dr. David Torchiana is the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of the
Massachusetts General Physicians Organization. The MGPO, associated with the
Massachusetts General Hospital, is a member of the Partners HealthCare System and
a teaching affiliate of the Harvard Medical School. The organization is a non-profit,
tax-exempt corporation and the largest physician group practice in New England,
representing more than 1,500 physicians.
Dr. Torchiana graduated from Yale College in 1976 and Harvard Medical School in
1981. He completed residencies in general surgery and cardiothoracic surgery at the
MGH before joining the Department of Surgery in 1989. Dr. Torchiana became Chief
of Cardiac Surgery at MGH in 1998 and CEO of the MGPO in 2003, and is an
Associate Professor of Surgery at Harvard Medical School.
Samuel O. Thier, M.D.
Professor of Medicine and Health Care Policy, Emeritus,
Harvard Medical School, Massachusetts General Hospital
Samuel O. Thier, M.D. is Professor of Medicine and Health Care Policy, Emeritus at
Harvard Medical School, Massachusetts General Hospital. In December 2002, Dr.
Thier retired from Partners HealthCare System, Inc. where he had been Chief
Executive Officer since July 1996. Previously, he served as President of The
Massachusetts General Hospital from 1994 through 1997 and as President of
Brandeis University from 1991 to 1994. He has served as President of the Institute
of Medicine, National Academy of Sciences, and he is a Fellow of the American
Academy of Arts and Sciences. Dr. Thier is currently a director of the Foundation of
the National Institutes of Health, a member of the Board of Overseers of TIAA-CREF,
a member of the Board of Overseers of Cornell University Weill Medical College, and
the Chairman of the Board of Overseers of Brandeis University Heller School for
Social Policy and Management.