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Dan Berlowitz,
MD, MPH,
is Director of the Center for
Health Quality, Outcomes and Economic Research. His research
interests center on assessing and improving the
quality of medical care, with particular
emphasis on ambulatory and long-term care
settings. His work focuses on examining outcome
measures in these settings, developing case-mix
adjustment models for these outcomes, and
evaluating how measures of the structure and
process of care relate to these outcomes. He
also maintains an active practice in geriatric
medicine and undertakes numerous studies
examining medical practices in the nursing
homes.
Boston University Biography VA email: Dan.Berlowitz@va.gov
Allen Gifford, MD, is Associate Director of CHQOER,
co-Research Coordinator of QUERI HIV/Hepatitis,
Associate Professor at BU SPH and Medicine, and
leads the Center’s Implementation-Dissemination
initiative. He provides CHQOER with a wealth of
research activities in health services and
quality improvement for HIV, and substantial
experience mentoring successful VA MREP, VA
post-doctoral, and NIH K-award scholars. He is
nationally known for his work on HIV, including
adherence to care, self-management, and access
to HIV health services. He has been PI of
numerous VA, NIH, and foundation grants. Dr.
Gifford will assist with the strategic and
administrative aspects of center leadership, and
will develop center capacity in health quality
and implementation research.
Boston University Biography
VA email:
Allen.Gifford@va.gov
Barbara Bokhour,
PhD,
is a research
health psychologist and an expert in qualitative
research methods. She is leading and
collaborating in studies that use qualitative
methods to improve communication in health care,
develop quality measures and understand provider
practices. She has recently been appointed as
the Qualitative Core leader for QUERI
HIV/Hepatitis and will be working closely with
that team in initiating new projects on
patient-provider communication in HIV screening.
Boston University Biography
VA email:
Barbara.Bokhour@va.gov
Ann Borzecki, MD,
MPH,
is assistant professor of health
services at Boston University School of Public
Health and a clinician-research scientist in the quality
section at CHQOER.
Her research has emphasized the
application of large databases to study issues
including the quality, epidemiology and
management of cardiovascular risk factors,
especially hypertension and more recently
chronic kidney disease. Recent work has also
focused in the area of patient safety and
timeliness of care. She serves as an
investigator-educator for the ALLHAT community
dissemination project.
Boston University Biography
VA email:
Ann.Borzecki@va.gov
Kathleen
Carey, PhD,
is Associate Professor at BU SPH
and has been a VA health economist since 1989.
She has advised agency officials by formulating,
executing, and interpreting economic analyses of
VA policy issues, particularly with regard to
cost efficiency. Since coming to CHQOER in 2006,
she has taken the lead in developing a model
analyzing the cost/quality trade-off in VA
hospitals that can be applied to improving
quality and patient safety in a manner that
maximizes effectiveness and promotes efficiency.
She also collaborates with QUERI
HIV/Hepatitis in order to bring a cost component
into studies of the effectiveness of increased
efforts at HIV testing. She served on the SMRB
this past year. Boston
University Biography
VA email: Kathleen.Carey@va.gov
Cindy
Christiansen, PhD,
is Senior Statistician, EAC member, BU Associate
Professor, and head of the Quantitative Methods
group. She is a nationally recognized expert on
profiling providers and in the use of Bayesian
and hierarchical modeling. She serves on the
Executive Committee for the newly formed VA
Statisticians Association, is a Fellow of the
American Statistical Association (ASA) and has
had leadership roles in the International
Association for Bayesian Analysis, the Institute
of Mathematical Statistics, and the Health
Policy Statistics Section of the ASA. She
continues to serve on a variety of NIH review
panels and was part of the Institute of Medicine
task force on complementary medicine.
Boston University Biography
email: cindylc@bu.edu
Jack Clark, PhD, is
a medical sociologist and Associate Professor at BU SPH. His research has focused on quality of life
impacts of chronic disease, patient-physician
communication and medical decision making, and
patient-perceived outcomes of cancer treatment.
Current research is investigating interventions
(e.g., patient navigators) to improve access and
continuity of care for vulnerable patients.
Boston University Biography
VA email:
Jack.Clark@va.gov
Mari-Lynn
Drainoni, MEd, PhD,
is a research scientist and BU SPH Associate
Professor. She has expertise in qualitative methods,
implementation research, and program evaluation.
Primary content areas are mental health and
substance abuse, disability and chronic illness, and
HIV. She also has a clinical background, having
provided mental health treatment services. She
currently serves on the SMRB.
Boston University Biography
VA email:
Mari-Lynn.Drainoni@va.gov
Susan Eisen,
PhD,
is a senior health research
scientist, Professor at BU SPH, member of the
EAC, and head of the Patient Centered Care
priority area. Her research focuses on the
assessment of patient-centered outcomes and
mental health quality. She is the primary
developer of several patient self-report quality
and outcome measures, including the Behavior and
Symptom Identification Scales (BASIS-32 and
BASIS-24), the Experience of Care and Health
Outcomes (ECHO) survey and the Perceptions of
Care Survey. These instruments are widely known
and used and have had an important impact on
national policy by their incorporation into
national performance measurement systems
accredited by JCAHO and the National Committee
for Quality Assurance. She serves on the MH
QUERI Schizophrenia Subgroup, the MyHealtheVet
Continuous Recovery Schizophrenia workgroup, and
on NIMH study sections.
Boston University Biography
VA email:
Susan.Eisen@med.va.gov
Rani Elwy, PhD,
is a research scientist with
expertise in health and social psychology. Her
research focuses on access to mental health care
and patient-physician communication. She is PI
of a NIMH-funded study examining patients'
perceptions of treatment for depression and
reasons why they have or have not sought help
from their primary care physician. She also
serves as on the advisory board of The Medical
Foundation, which funds health services research
in Boston's public health community.
Boston University Biography VA email:
Rani.Elwy@va.gov
Graeme Fincke, MD, is a research scientist, EAC member, and served as
Acting Associate Director of CHQOER from 2004-2006.
He has more than 30 years experience as a teacher,
clinician, and researcher. He has had extensive
service on the IRB and serves as local resource on
human studies issues. He has special research
expertise in medication use, focusing on medication
adherence, polypharmacy, and use of prescription
databases for research. He is also one of the
founding members of CAPP at BU SPH.
Boston University Biography VA email:
fincke.b@boston.va.gov
Mark Glickman, PhD,
is a Statistician at CHQOER, and
Associate Professor at BU SPH. He provides
statistical support and guidance in the design
and analysis of health care-related projects.
Recent work includes statistical modeling of
non-ignorable dropouts in longitudinal studies,
differential item functioning in IRT models, and
modeling physician treatment behavior for
diabetes and hypertensive patients. He reviews
grants on the NIH HSOD study section and
co-edits a column in Chance magazine.
Boston University Biography
email:
mg@bu.edu
Elaine Cominos Hickey, MSN, RN, CPHQ, is a nurse-investigator with interest in long-term
and palliative care. Her research includes several
Congressionally mandated national program
evaluations in geriatric care and serving as site PI
on the national evaluation of the Minimum Data Set.
Additionally, as Research Compliance Officer for
VISN 1, she serves as liaison between facility
research programs and the VISN Director.
VA email:
Elaine.Hickey@va.gov
Kathy Horvath, RN, PhD,
is a nurse investigator and has a shared appointment
with GRECC. She is a national expert in managing
patients with Alzheimer’s Disease and creating a
safe home environment. VA email:
Kathy.Horvath@med.va.gov
Alan Jette, PhD,
is a past Dean of the BU Sargent
College of Health and Rehabilitation Sciences,
Director of the Health & Disability Research
Institute, and since 2006 Professor at BU SPH. He is
a national leader in disability research and in
assessments of functional status. He is performing
innovative work using IRT and CAT to capture
patient-reported outcomes. His work is synergistic
with CHQOER interests and since joining the SPH, he
has become an active collaborator with CHQOER
faculty.
Boston University Biography
Lewis Kazis, ScD,
is a past HSR&D Research Career Scientist, EAC
member, and head of the priority area on Medication
Effectiveness. He is also Director of the Center for
the Assessment of Pharmaceutical Practices (CAPP) at
BU SPH. He is an internationally-recognized expert
in patient-reported outcomes and studies of
medication effectiveness. He developed the Veterans
RAND 36 item and 12 Item Health Surveys (VR-36 and
VR-12) which have now been administered to more than
2 million veterans and have also been adopted by
CMS. His VA service currently includes co-chair for
a RR&D SMRB study section and membership on a COE
Steering Committee and a cooperative trial data
monitoring board.
Boston University Biography
email:
lek@bu.edu Veterans
RAND 12 Item Health Survey (VR-12)
Nancy Kressin,
PhD,
is an HSR&D Research Career Scientist (recently
renewed for another five year term), an Associate
Professor at BU School of Medicine, a member of
CHQOER’s EAC, and Director of CHQOER Training
Programs. She is nationally known for her work on
understanding racial disparities in care, especially
from the patient’s perspective. She has applied this
expertise to cardiovascular diseases and dental
care, and she has led interventions aimed at
enhancing patient-provider communication and
reducing racial disparities. She serves on national
VA committees including the review groups for Career
Development Awards and Research Career Scientists as
well as the Steering Committee for another COE.
Boston University Biography
VA email: Nancy.Kressin@va.gov
Donald Miller,
ScD, is a senior health research scientist, Associate
Professor at BU SPH and serves as Director of
Research at CAPP. He has expertise in the areas of
chronic disease epidemiology, pharmaco-epidemiology,
and health outcomes assessment. He has served as an
investigator on over 30 VA research projects and is
currently principal investigator of DEpiC, a
valuable research resource in the VA.
Boston University Biography VA email:
Donald.Miller4@va.gov
Xinhua (Steve) Ren, PhD,
is a Health Research Scientist at
CHQOER. He has expertise in patient-centered
care and medication treatment. He has published
articles focusing on patient-based assessment
using both generic and disease-specific
measures. He has also evaluated pharmacotherapy
among patients with schizophrenia, determining
associations among prescription patterns,
treatment adherence, and outcomes.
email:
xsren@bu.edu
Amy Rosen, PhD,
is
an HSR&D Research Career Scientist, Professor at
BU SPH, member of the EAC, and head of the
priority area in Patient Safety. She is a
national expert in the use of the PSIs and has
helped AHRQ revise their indicator definitions
based on findings using VA clinical data. She is
also an expert in risk adjustment, and was the
first researcher to apply leading commercial
risk-adjustment systems to national VA data to
measure disease burden. She led the development
of a diagnosis-based psychiatric case-mix
measure specifically for VA patients with mental
health and substance abuse disorders. She serves
on several AHRQ national committees and is a
member of the HSR&D SMRB.
Boston University Biography
VA email:
Amy.Rosen2@va.gov
James Rothendler, MD,
is a cardiologist with a background in medical
informatics. His interests include computerized
clinical decision support systems, pharmaceutical
evaluations utilizing large-scale prescription
databases, and methodologies for patient-centered
data collection. His expertise in VISTA/CPRS and the
use of VA Fileman to extract data from local VISTA
systems has been an invaluable asset in facilitating
the collection of specific types of data needed for
research.
Boston University Biography
VA email:
Jim.Rothendler@med.va.gov
Alfredo Selim, MD, is a CHQOER clinician-researcher and past CDA
recipient. He has expertise in the area of
risk-adjustment and has been PI on grants examining
outpatient mortality and changes in patient-reported
health status as quality indicators. He also has
been active in analyses comparing health status of
veterans to that of Medicare enrollees in the
Medicare Health of Seniors program. His paper on
this topic was widely cited in the lay press as
indicating the success of the VA healthcare system.
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