Authors
The Michigan Value Collaborative (MVC) is a partnership between Michigan hospitals and Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Michigan (BCBSM) designed to accelerate improvements in both quality and cost efficiency across the state. Working in conjunction with the other specialty-specific Collaborative Quality Improvement programs in BCBSM’s Value Partnership Program, MVC aims to understand variation in healthcare use, identify best practices, and lead interventions for improving care before, during, and after hospitalization.
Joseph Andelin is the founder of Olavi Group, LLC, a healthcare research and consulting firm. His work focuses on quantitative storytelling for commercially insured healthcare strategies, equity market research and insights, as well as healthcare and financial literacy. His past professional experience includes roles at Goldman Sachs, ExtendHealth, Willis Towers Watson, and Compass Professional Health Services.
As healthcare’s largest provider of clinical communication solutions, TigerConnect helps physicians, nurses, and other staff communicate and collaborate more effectively, accelerating productivity, reducing costs, and improving patient outcomes. Trusted by more than 4,000 healthcare organizations, TigerConnect maintains 99.99% uptime and processes over 10 million messages each day. Its category-leading product innovations and advanced integrations with critical hospital systems deliver high value for hospitals and large health systems.
Amy McNally, MD, is chair of The US Oncology Network’s Surgery Advisory Council. She is in practice with Minnesota Oncology.
Sophia Bernazzani is a health care journalist. She has a background in healthcare and previously worked in health marketing and advocacy. She's passionate about nutrition and sustainability and studied global public health at the George Washington University.
Tina Joseph, PharmD, BCACP is an Assistant Professor of Pharmacy Practice at Nova Southeastern University College of Pharmacy (NSUCOP) in Fort Lauderdale, FL where she focuses on ambulatory care. Dr. Joseph earned a Doctorate in Pharmacy from St. John’s University College of Pharmacy in Queens, NY. She then completed a PGY1 residency at Long Island Jewish Medical Center in New Hyde Park, NY. She then went on to complete PGY2 Ambulatory Care Residency at The Brooklyn Hospital Center in Brooklyn, NY. Her practice site is located at Cambridge Medical Group in Boynton Beach, FL, a primary care physicians' office within an Accountable Care Organization (ACO). Dr. Joseph is an integral member of the ACO Research Network Services and Education (ACORN SEED) team focusing on integrating pharmacists in value-based care models and providing innovative opportunities for students within ACOs. She currently serves as the Residency Program Director for the PGY2 Ambulatory Care Program at NSUCOP. She has conducted several research projects, presented national and local posters and podium presentations. Her research interests include transitions of care, accountable care organizations, anticoagulation, and diabetes.
Dr. Brull is a family medicine physician in solo practice in Plainville, Kansas, at the Prairie Star Family Practice. 2015 marks her fourteenth year of private practice in a rural area, where she precepts medical and physician assistant students on a regular basis. She served 2 years (2013-2014) as a Health Information Technology Fellow for the Office of the National Coordinator, and was recently recognized as a Hypertension Control Challenge Champion by the CDC. Dr. Brull is a physician leader in quality improvement, electronic record adoption, change management, and health information exchanges. Special interests include integrating promotion of health behaviors into office visits and the use of social media in medicine. Dr. Brull also serves as a physician delegate to the American Academy of Family Physicians.
Gary Mangiofico, PhD, is an academic director and executive professor of organizational theory and management at the Pepperdine Graziadio Business School (https://bschool.pepperdine.edu/) . He has taught at the school since 2002, and brings more than 20 years of experience leading strategic development, operations management, turnaround operations as a CEO, COO, and general management executive. In addition, he is also COO and senior vice president (SVP) for Pathmakers, SVP for Apria Healthcare Group, and CEO for CPC Alhambra Hospital.
Brenda Hopkins, eFax Corporate Chief Health Information Officer, specializes in the area of healthcare interoperability where she is focused on open data exchange of healthcare information inside and outside of the electronic health record and using open platforms and tools such as APIs as a means of sharing. She started her career as a pediatric/neonatal transport nurse and brings a patient/user centered team-oriented approach to technology build and enablement for leading software solutions. Prior to joining eFax Corporate, Hopkins held leadership positions at GE Healthcare, Kaiser Permanente and Adventist Health purchasing, building, implementing and scaling large enterprise electronic health records and ancillary solutions with a strong focus on meeting clinical, revenue, safety, and quality goals in value-based payment models and care delivery programs.
Amanda Waltemath, PharmD, MPH, is a clinical pharmacist at Healthesystems She leverages her special interest in pain management and data analysis to direct the firm's opioid therapy management program and develop risk assessment tools for workers' compensation payers. Her responsibilities include creating medication formularies for clients; tracking and analyzing pharmacy trends, and conducting drug therapy reviews and pharmacotherapy evaluations. In addition, she provides educational programs on emerging issues in prescription drug therapies and serves as a clinical resource for clients and colleagues.
Dr Druz is a nationally recognized expert in cardiology, with a focus on prevention and cardiac imaging. She has a long-standing interest in functional medicine, and has developed comprehensive programs utilizing genomic and metabolic approaches for treatment and prevention of cardiac disease. Dr Druz is a passionate believer in creating web-based and mobile tools for patient engagement. In 2013, Dr Druz launched a start-up company, iVisitMD, Inc, which connects patients seeking evaluation for urgent symptoms with healthcare professionals for walk-in, phone or video visits.
L. Patrick James, MD, is the Chief Clinical Officer, Health Plans and Policy, at Quest Diagnostics. Prior to assuming this role, he served in other senior leadership roles within Quest. Before joining Quest Diagnostics, Dr. James served LabOne as Executive Vice President for Pathology and Laboratory Services. He spent nine years with Health Midwest, a 14 hospital integrated delivery system in Kansas City, as Medical Director of Hospital Integration. Dr. James’ experience spans Research Medical Center, St. Joseph Hospital in Denver, Colorado, and National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland. Dr. James earned his medical degree with honors from St. Louis University.
Isha Bangia, PharmD, MBA, is a manager of US market access at Certara Evidence & Access. She received her PharmD from Rutgers University and an MBA from Johns Hopkins University. Her current responsibilities include optimizing product value stories and working with customers to improve access across the US healthcare system. Her experience includes practicing pharmacy, payer market research, and pharma strategy and analytics. Her work has covered many therapeutic areas, including biosimilars, oncology, diabetes, vaccines, and rare diseases.
Daniel J. Klein is the president and chief executive officer at the Patient Access Network (PAN) Foundation. Mr Klein came to the PAN Foundation from the Cystic Fibrosis (CF) Foundation, where he was senior vice president for Patient Access Programs and, prior to that, senior vice president for the CF Services specialty pharmacy. Mr Klein has had numerous leadership roles in the health and information technology (IT) sectors, including as chairman and CEO of Panurgy Corporation, a leading mid-market IT services company, as well as a consultant on health planning and health promotion for the World Health Organization and HHS, respectively.
David Grandin is CEO of Kiio, a pioneer in digital therapeutics. Kiio’s flagship product, Kiio for Low Back Pain, is an evidence-based, AI-driven solution that stratifies, engages, and supports back pain sufferers with targeted exercise, education, and interactive digital coaching, backed by care management. The solution has been proven to significantly reduce pain, opioid use, and medical costs, improving quality of life for the individual while delivering cost savings and increased productivity. Kiio works with health plans, employers, and other at-risk entities, providing a cost-effective, easy-to-implement solution tailored to the needs of its partners.
Peter Boland, PhD is a national thought leader with 35 years of practical experience in strategic thinking and trend forecasting. He has worked with numerous hospitals, delivery systems and payers on change management and market restructuring. Peter offers an independent and original point of view and challenges organizations to anticipate “what’s next?” He has written more than 100 articles for dozens of professional journals and 5 books on manage care. He is often quoted in trade and news media such as The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, The Economist, and The PBS News Hour.
The Alliance for Physical Therapy Quality and Innovation (APTQI) unites small, medium and large physical therapy practices to advocate for the physical therapy profession in the areas of payment reform, quality initiatives, outcomes and innovation projects. We are an aligned group of therapists and practices who share a common vision for the future of our profession. Our goal is to establish physical therapy as the treatment of choice and the best value for patients and payers.
Brian is the co-founder and president of Advera Health Analytics (previously AdverseEvents Inc). He brings more than 15 years of experience building and managing companies in the data, research and investment industries. Previously, Brian co-founded Sagient Research Systems, Inc, where he served as the company's president and CEO from 1999 to 2009 and as the chairman of the board from 2010 until the company's acquisition by Informa plc in May 2012. While at Sagient Research, Brian was responsible for the development, production, and sale of the Company's proprietary research products to global enterprises including pharmaceutical companies, investment banks, mutual and hedge funds, academic institutions, and government agencies.
Blair Burnett, Senior Policy Analyst at the Association of Community Cancer Centers (ACCC), oversees the analysis of federal regulations and coverage decisions relevant to ACCC membership, serves as the Project Lead for ACCC's Oncology Care Model (OCM) Collaborative, and supports participating OCM practices in their transition to value-based care.
Blair's areas of focus include the OCM, broader implementation efforts surrounding value-based care, social determinants of health, and analysis of the changing oncology delivery landscape. Her primary interest stems from exploring the intersection of public health and healthcare in the oncology community. Prior to joining ACCC, Blair worked in care access and revenue cycle divisions of Huron Consulting Group, working with hospitals across the country.
Randy Tomlin is CEO and Chairman of the Board for MobileSmith Health. In his position, Randy directs the company’s strategic growth and operational excellence, and is responsible for the successful proliferation of the company’s mobile app technologies throughout the healthcare spectrum.
Samantha Eisenstein Watson, MBA, is the chief executive officer and founder of The Samfund. Sam is a 2-time young adult cancer survivor. After completing her treatment for Ewing's sarcoma and secondary myelodysplastic syndrome, she co-founded The Samfund in 2003 after recognizing a void in programs and services tailored specifically for young adult cancer survivors. She is an active member of the cancer community and an advocate for young adult survivors throughout the country. Sam holds a BA and an MBA from Brandeis University.
Vice President, Data Evidence & Insights Operations, McKesson
Sarah Alwardt, PhD. is vice president of Data, Evidence and Insights at McKesson and leads the real-world evidence and commercial intelligence operational teams. She is an accomplished leader with 15+ years of domestic and international experience in delivering data-driven insights for pharmaceutical companies. Prior to joining McKesson, Dr. Alwardt spent 10 years at Humana where she revitalized the research business and drove strategic planning for Humana Pharmacy Solutions.
Tashfeen Ekram, MD, is the co-founder and chief medical officer of Luma Health. He is also a practicing radiologist at the Redwood Radiology Group, specializing in chest imaging. In his role as chief medical officer, Dr. Ekram serves as a strategic customer contact to ensure the company’s patient relationship management system delivers optimal clinical workflows and meets the goals of Luma Health’s customers. Dr. Ekram completed his fellowship at Stanford Hospital and is a graduate of the University of Michigan Medical School. A Fulbright Scholar, Dr. Ekram spent 1 year in Jordan researching the effects of population displacement due to war, with a special focus on the impact on children.
Adam Sabloff, chief executive officer and founder of VirtualHealth, is a nationally recognized leader and executive in the healthcare industry. Adam’s impact in the field can be traced back to the mid-2000s, when he co-created the Ritz-Carlton Residences in Baltimore and discovered a significant gap leaving seniors and the chronically ill without access to essential care delivery and technology. That insight, coupled with the loss of a loved one to a late-stage diagnosis, led Adam to develop VirtualHealth's HELIOS platform, the first comprehensive care management solution purpose-built for integrated value-based care. Designed for use by payers and providers, the platform aggregates and normalizes patient data from multiple sources effectively providing healthcare organizations with the tools to provide proactive, quality care. Adam is a frequent speaker at healthcare and technology events, including the annual J.P. Morgan Healthcare Conference, Parks Associates’ Connected Health Summit, and Amazon's Voice Summit, where he discusses topics such as the need for advanced health IT solutions to achieve a true “whole-person” view of the patient.
Having an interest in healthcare, Rehm quickly found himself communicating executive-level nursing strategies on patient experience, care continuity, and frontline engagement to chief nursing officers and chief executive officers of some of the nation's leading healthcare systems. Currently, he is the community manager for Nursing@Georgetown, the online Master of Science degree in Nursing program from Georgetown University School of Nursing and Health Studies.
Joey Mattingly, PharmD, MBA, currently serves as an assistant professor in the Department of Pharmacy Practice and Science at the University of Maryland School of Pharmacy, where he teaches business strategy to PharmD students and is a strategic consultant for the University of Maryland Medical Center. In addition to his work as a faculty member, he serves as Director of Operations for the PATIENTS Program and Principal for A & J Consulting, LLC. His primary research interests include cost-effectiveness, patient-centered outcomes, and health policy.
Gerald Niedzwiecki, MD, is a board-certified and fellowship trained interventional radiologist at Advanced Imaging and Interventional Institute, an interventional outpatient center in Tampa Bay, Florida. He is also a member of the CardioVascular Coalition.
