Appendix H
Biographical Sketches
EDWARD B. PERRIN (Chair) is a biostatistician and health services researcher, a professor emeritus and former chair of the Department of Health Services and of the Department of Biostatistics at the University of Washington. He is a member of the Institute of Medicine (IOM) and a former member of the Committee on National Statistics of the National Research Council (NRC). He is a former director of the National Center for Health Statistics, DHHS, and past president, member of the Governing Board, and distinguished fellow of the Academy for Health Services Research and Health Policy and fellow of the American Statistical Association. Dr. Perrin has served as chair of the Health Services Research Study Section and as a member of the National Advisory Council for the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, DHHS, and as chair of the Scientific Advisory Committee of the Medical Outcomes Trust. He has served on a number of IOM and NRC study panels, including the Committee to Design a Strategy for Quality Review and Assurance in Medicare, the Committee on Health Care Reform, the Committee on U.S. Physician Supply, the Panel on the National Health Care Survey and the Panel on Performance Measures and Data for Public Health Performance Partnership Grants, serving as chair of the latter two. Dr Perrin’s recent research and teaching interests and scientific publications have focused on the development of new methodologies for the measurement of health outcomes and the structure and use of large health data systems in decision making and policy development. He received a B.A. in mathematics from Middlebury College, an M.A. in math
ematical statistics from Columbia University, and a Ph.D. in statistics from Stanford University.
HECTOR BALCAZAR is professor of Latino Public Health and chair of the Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences, School of Public Health, Health Sciences Center, University of North Texas. He is also the director of the Center for Cross-Cultural and Community Health Research of the Institute for Public Health Research, School of Public Health. Dr. Balcazar specializes in the study of public health problems of Latinos/Mexican Americans. Dr. Balcazar is a bilingual, bicultural family and public health scientist who has conducted numerous studies of Latino birth outcomes, acculturation and health-related behaviors, cardiovascular disease prevention programs in Latinos, and border health issues. His most recent funded projects include: The North Texas Salud Para Corazon Outreach Initiative; a study on the use of perinatal, infant, and childhood health services among high-risk Mexican American subgroups; the development of a strategic plan for the Latino National Health Collaborative; and a clinical study for Hispanic diabetic patients. As a Latino health specialist Dr. Balcazar provides consultation and leadership to local and national health organizations.
ANTHONY D’ANGELO worked as a statistician, operations research analyst, and mathematician for federal government agencies for 33 years. He developed information systems and analytical models for product assurance, communication systems, and health services. He worked for the Indian Health Service the last 22 years of his career. Mr. D’Angelo served as the principal statistician of the Indian Health Service and manager of the program statistics team. He developed and managed statistical information systems in order to provide data for measuring health status and appraising program activities. He published morbidity and demographic data concerning the American Indian and Alaska Native population. He retired from the government in December 1999 and moved from the Washington, D.C., area to Phoenix, Arizona. He now provides statistical consulting services, specializing in American Indian and Alaska Native data, and volunteers at the World Affairs Council and the Heard Indian Museum.
JOSÉ J. ESCARCE is a senior natural scientist at RAND. Dr. Escarce graduated from Princeton University, earned a master’s degree in physics from Harvard University, obtained his medical degree and doctorate in health economics from the University of Pennsylvania, and completed his residency at Stanford University. Dr. Escarce has served on the Health Services Research Study Section at the Agency for Health Care Policy and Research and on the National Advisory Council for Health Care Policy,
Research, and Evaluation of the Department of Health and Human Services. He also serves on the National Advisory Committee of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Minority Medical Faculty Development Program and is past chair of the Health Economics Committee of the American Public Health Association. He was member of the IOM Committee on Understanding and Eliminating Racial and Ethnic Disparities in Health Care. Dr. Escarce’s research interests include provider and patient behavior under economic incentives, access to care, racial and ethnic disparities in care, and the impact of managed care on cost and quality.
WILLIAM D. KALSBEEK is professor of biostatistics and director of the Survey Research Unit at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill. His prior experience includes statistical research with the Office of Research and Methodology at the National Center for Health Statistics and at the Sampling Research and Design Center at the Research Triangle Institute in North Carolina. He is a fellow of the American Statistical Association and a member of the American Association of Public Opinion Research, and the American Public Health Association. He received his M.P.H. and Ph.D. degrees in biostatistics from the University of Michigan. Dr. Kalsbeek’s research interests and areas of expertise are in biostatistics, survey design and research, spinal cord injuries, and assessment; he is well known for his work in survey methods.
GEORGE KAPLAN is professor and chair of the Department of Epidemiology in the School of Public Health, senior research scientist at the Institute for Social Research, and director of the Michigan Initiative on Inequalities in Health. He is also a docent at the University of Kuopio in Finland and an associate in the Population Health Program of the Canadian Institute for Advanced Research. He was formerly chief of the Human Population Laboratory and directed the ongoing Alameda County Study. Upon arriving at the University of Michigan, Professor Kaplan initiated the Michigan Initiative on Inequalities in Health (MIIH). The MIIH is a cross-campus initiative with an expanding agenda that will eventually involve all segments of the university community. The mission of the MIIH is to promote inquiry into the causes and consequences of societal inequalities in health and potential remedies, via an interdisciplinary program of discussion, research, and teaching. The goals are to catalyze intellectual interchange, research, and teaching focused on issues raised by the study of inequalities in health through a program of in-depth discussion, lectures, and symposia; an ongoing Forum on Inequalities in Health; small grants; and student stipends. Dr. Kaplan is also director of the Michigan Interdisciplinary Center on Social Inequalities, Mind, and Body (MICSIMB).
DENISE LOVE is the executive director of the National Association of Health Data Organizations (NAHDO), a nonprofit membership and educational organization dedicated to strengthening the nation’s health information system. Ms. Love is actively involved in national standards forums, developing integrated Internet systems, and establishing analytic frame-works for major health data sets. NAHDO works to assure the public availability of valid and useful information for diverse audiences. To that end, NAHDO provides technical assistance to states and develops national forums for state, federal, and private-sector leaders. Formerly the director of the Office of Health Data Analysis, Utah Department of Health, Ms. Love’s office established statewide reporting systems for inpatient, ambulatory surgery, and emergency department data and in 1996 established Utah’s HEDIS reporting for commercial and Medicaid managed care plans. In 1993, her office created the Utah Internet Query System—a Web-based interactive data dissemination tool. An adjunct faculty member in the Department of Family and Preventive Medicine, University of Utah School of Medicine, Ms. Love serves on committees and boards including: Utah Health Insight Governing Council and the Steering Committee of the Public Health Data Standards Consortium. She serves as an adviser and speaker on state health data issues and is the coauthor of several journal articles and numerous state publications. Ms. Love has a bachelor’s of science in nursing and a master’s of business in health care administration.
JOHN LUMPKIN has been Illinois’s public health director since 1991 and is the first African American to hold the position. He has served the third longest tenure of any director since the present agency structure was created in 1917. As director of the Illinois Department of Public Health (IDPH), Dr. Lumpkin oversees an agency of 1,300 employees located in Springfield, Chicago, seven regional offices, and three laboratories who share primary responsibility for the quality of life in the state. IDPH leads a public health system that encompasses partners in various fields and locations, including local and federal health departments, nursing homes, hospitals, physicians, paramedics, plumbers, and food service workers to name a few, who work to promote the health and safety of Illinois’s citizens and visitors to the state through the prevention and control of diseases and injury. Dr. Lumpkin’s career in public health began with his appointment in 1985 as associate director of IDPH’s Office of Health Care Regulations, which oversees the licensing, inspection, and certification of health care facilities. In September 1990, he was named the department’s acting director by Governor James R. Thompson. Four months later, newly elected Governor Jim Edgar appointed him to the director’s job. Dr. Lumpkin was reappointed to the post by Governor George H. Ryan in January 1999.
ALVIN T. ONAKA is chief of the Office of Health Status Monitoring and state registrar of Vital Statistics for the Hawaii State Department of Health. Prior to returning home to Hawaii he worked for the U.S. National Academy of Sciences and was assigned to the Department of Epidemiology and Statistics at the Radiation Effects Research Foundation in Hiroshima, Japan. From 1974 to 1978 he worked for the U.S. Agency for International Development in Washington, D.C., where he managed population and health projects in Latin American, Africa, and Asia. Dr. Onaka received his Ph.D. degree in demography in 1975 from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst where he was a Population Council Fellow in Demography. He has done postgraduate work in epidemiology and has been on the faculty of the Population Studies Program at the University of Hawaii since 1982. He has served as chair of the U.S. Death Certificate Revision Committee and is an adviser to the National Death Index of the National Center for Health Statistics. Currently he is president of the National Association for Public Health Statistics and Information Systems headquartered in Washington, D.C.
NEIL R. POWE is professor of medicine in the Department of Medicine at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and director of the Welch Center for Prevention, Epidemiology and Clinical Research, an interdisciplinary research and training center at the Johns Hopkins Medical Institutions focused on clinical and population-based research. He also is professor of epidemiology and health policy and management at the Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health, where he directs the Clinical Epidemiology Program and the Johns Hopkins Evidence-Based Practice Center. Dr. Powe’s research has also involved clinical epidemiology, health services research, and patient outcomes research in renal and cardiovascular disease. His research has used prospective methods of randomized controlled trials and cohort studies, cost-effectiveness analysis, meta-analysis, retrospective analyses of administrative databases, and survey research. Dr. Powe has published more than 160 articles on these topics. Dr. Powe is principal investigator of the CHOICE study, an End-Stage Renal Disease (ESRD) Patient Outcomes Research Team funded by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality and the ESRD Quality (EQUAL) Study. He has extensive experience in developing and measuring outcomes in chronic kidney disease patients using data from prospective studies, the United States Renal Data System (USRDS), Medicare records, and patient surveys. Dr. Powe was a member of the Institute of Medicine Committee on Measuring, Managing and Improving Quality of Care in the ESRD Treatment Setting. He received his MD degree from Harvard Medical School, his MPH degree from the Harvard School of Public Health, and his MBA in health care from the Wharton Graduate School of the University of Penn-
sylvania. He completed his internship and residency in internal medicine at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. He was also a Robert Wood Johnson Clinical Scholar and fellow in the Division of General Internal Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. Dr. Powe is a member of the American Society of Clinical Investigation and a Fellow of the American College of Physicians. He is the recipient of several national awards including the best article of the year (2000) by the Academy for Health Services Research and Health Policy and one of the leading African-American physicians in the U.S. (2001) by Black Enterprise magazine.
JONATHAN SKINNER is the John French Professor of Economics, Dartmouth College, and a professor in the Department of Community and Family Medicine, Dartmouth Medical School. He has been a research associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research since 1989 and is currently the editor of the Journal of Human Resources. He was a recipient of the TIAA-CREF Paul A. Samuelson Award of Excellence in 1996. Professor Skinner’s research has focused on the economics of saving and consumption, the effectiveness of medical technology, and issues of fairness and equity in health care.
L. CARL VOLPE is vice president for Strategic Health Partnerships in the Healthcare Quality Assurance Division at WellPoint Health Networks Inc., where he is responsible for developing and implementing strategic projects with hospitals physicians, foundations, and academic institutions to improve services and quality of care for WellPoint members. Previously, as vice president for Health Policy and Analysis, he was responsible for strategic policy development—working within the corporation to anticipate and successfully respond to the potential business impact of state and federal health legislative action. Volpe joined WellPoint in June 1996 as director of Health Policy and Analysis. Prior to WellPoint, he served as director of Health Legislation at the National Governors’ Association in Washington, D.C. There, he coordinated the development and implementation of Governors’ healthcare policies and advocated those policies to congress and the administration. Previously, he held several positions at the Texas Department of Human Services, most recently as director of health policy initiatives in the Medicaid program. Volpe has experience in a variety of health care arenas including managed care, commercial health insurance, health care financing systems, state/federal relationships in public and private health reform, and Medicaid. He received his Ph.D. in experimental psychology from Northeastern University in Boston. He was awarded a postdoctoral fellowship in applied psychology and evaluation at St. Louis University and was a senior research associate at St. Louis University’s Center for Urban Programs.
DAVID WILLIAMS is a professor of sociology and senior research scientist in the Institute for Social Research at the University of Michigan. His previous academic appointment was at Yale University. Dr. Williams’s research has focused on differences in socioeconomic status in health in general and the health of the African American population in particular. He has served as a consultant to numerous federal health agencies and private organizations. He has also served on the National Committee on Vital and Health Statistics and chaired its Subcommittee on Minority and Other Special Populations. He is a member of the National Science Foundation’s Board of Overseers for the General Social Survey. He has an M.P.H. from Loma Linda University, an M.Div. from Andrews University, and a Ph.D. in sociology from the University of Michigan. He has served on the NRC Panel on Needle Exchange and Bleach Distribution Programs and the IOM Committee on Understanding and Eliminating Racial and Ethnic Disparities in Health Care.
ALAN ZASLAVSKY is an associate professor of Statistics in the Department of Health Care Policy at Harvard Medical School. Dr. Zaslavsky’s methodological research interests include surveys, census methodology, missing data, categorical data, hierarchical modeling, small-area estimation, and applied Bayesian methodology. Dr. Zaslavsky’s health services research focuses primarily on developing methodology for quality measurement of health plans and other units and understanding the implications of these quality measurements. A large part of his work has been related to the development, implementation, and analysis of the Consumer Assessments of Health Plans Study (CAHPS), a comprehensive program for survey measurement of enrollee reports and ratings of their health plans, and particularly the implementation of this survey for the Medicare managed care population. He has also studied disparities in health care, as indicated by clinical quality measures and utilization. Current work in this area includes involvement in the NCI-funded CanCORS project for evaluation of disparities in processes and outcomes of cancer care.
