Speakers for the
Governor’s Conference on e-Health
December 5, 2005

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Mitchell L. Adams
Executive Director
Massachusetts Technology Collaborative

Mitchell Adams is Executive Director of the Massachusetts Technology Collaborative (MTC), the state’s development agency for the innovation economy with programs in nanotechnology, renewable energy, and broadband/wireless deployment. Its e-Health Initiative speeds the adoption of advanced technologies that improve the quality of care and reduce costs.

Adams has a distinguished record of 30 years in leadership positions in the private and public sectors in healthcare, banking/investment management, real estate development, and entrepreneurial ventures. As State Revenue Commissioner from 1991-1998, he introduced cutting-edge information technologies to increase efficiency, including high speed document imaging, and “Telefile,” which became a national model.

Adams is a member of the Board of Overseers of Harvard University and a member of the Overseers’ Committees for Information Technology and the Harvard Medical School. He serves as Chairman of the Massachusetts eHealth Collaborative. Adams also serves as a member of the Board of Trustees of the Boston Athenaeum and Harvard Vanguard Medical Associates. Previously, he served as Dean for Finance and Business at the Harvard Medical School and Vice Chancellor for Administration and Finance at the University of Massachusetts Medical Center.

Adams holds AB and MBA degrees from Harvard University.

Carl J. Ascenzo
Senior Vice President and Chief Information Officer
Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts (BCBSMA)

Carl J. Ascenzo is a Senior Vice President and Chief Information Officer of Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts (BCBSMA). He oversees the Information Technology Division and is responsible for the company’s technology strategy, new systems development, and technology operations in support of 2.8 million members.

BCBSMA has a strong history of investing in information technology to support industry leading business performance excellence, and has received several awards in recognition of its technology leadership.

Ascenzo represents BCBSMA as a Board member of the Massachusetts Health Data Consortium and chairs the MA-SHARE Board of Managers. He is also a Board member of the Massachusetts e-Health Collaborative and chairs the Capital Funding Committee, and is co-chair of America’s Health Insurance Plans’ business and technology sub-committee. Ascenzo has been acknowledged for his industry leadership with awards from Insurance & Technology Magazine, the Massachusetts Health Data Consortium, and the Massachusetts Technology Leadership Council.

Charles D. Baker
President and CEO
Harvard Pilgrim Health Care, Inc.

Charles D. Baker is President and CEO of Harvard Pilgrim Health Care, Inc., one of New England’s leading non-profit health plans. Harvard Pilgrim and its affiliates are licensed to provide comprehensive health insurance solutions in Massachusetts, Maine, and New Hampshire. Its provider network has more than 22,000 physicians and 125 hospitals in MA, ME, NH, and Rhode Island. HPHC and its affiliates offer health and benefit plan solutions to over 900,000 members in New England. Under Baker’s leadership, HPHC has finished first in the country for two years in a row on the National Committee for Quality Assurance’s annual ranking of health plan performance.

Baker spent eight years in Massachusetts state government, where he served as Secretary of Administration and Finance and Secretary of Health and Human Services during the Weld and Cellucci Administrations.

Baker holds a Master's Degree in Management, with a concentration in Public Administration and Finance, from Northwestern’s Kellogg School and a BA in English from Harvard College.

David W. Bates, MD, MSc
Chief of the Division of General Medicine
Brigham and Women’s Hospital
Medical Director of Clinical and Quality Analysis
Partners Healthcare System

Dr. David W. Bates is the Chief of the Division of General Medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Medical Director of Clinical and Quality Analysis for Partners Healthcare System, which includes Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Massachusetts General Hospital, and Faulkner Hospital. He is a Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School and works in the Division of General Medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and is a practicing general internist. Trained as a clinical epidemiologist, his primary interest has been the use of computer systems to improve patient care. The overall focus of that work has been on improving the systems by which drugs are given.

Dr. Bates’ special research interests include clinical decision-making and affecting physician-decision-making, particularly using computerized interventions; quality of care and cost-effectiveness in medical practice; and outcomes assessment. He has also published on improving efficiency and quality using information systems by giving physicians information about clinical laboratory and radiology tests. Taken together, the results of these studies have demonstrated that providing computerized decision support can substantially reduce the costs of care while improving safety.

David Bowen
Minority Staff Director for Health
Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions

David Bowen is Minority Staff Director for Health of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions. In this position, Dr. Bowen has responsibility for a broad range of health policy. In 1999, Dr. Bowen joined the staff of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor & Pensions as a Congressional Fellow with the American Association for the Advancement of Science. From 2000 to 2002, he held a joint appointment as a Visiting Fellow in the Department of Health Care Policy at the Harvard Medical School. Prior to joining the Kennedy staff, Dr. Bowen received his undergraduate education at Brown University then earned a Ph.D. in neurobiology at the University of California, San Francisco. He subsequently had a postdoctoral appointment at Regeneron Pharmaceuticals before joining a startup biotechnology company as a Senior Staff Scientist.

David J. Brailer,  MD, Ph.D.
National Coordinator for Health Information Technology
Department of Health and Human Services

Dr. David J. Brailer was appointed the first National Health Information Technology Coordinator on May 6, 2004. As National Coordinator, Dr. Brailer executes the actions ordered by President George W. Bush in his Executive Order of April 27, 2004, which called for widespread deployment of health information technology within 10 years to help realize substantial improvements in safety and efficiency. Dr. Brailer is recognized as a leader in the strategy and financing of quality and efficiency in healthcare, with a particular emphasis on health information technology and health systems management.

Prior to his appointment, Dr. Brailer was a Senior Fellow at the Health Technology Center in San Francisco, CA, a non-profit research and education organization that provides strategic information and resources to healthcare organizations about the future impact of technology in health care delivery. At the Center, he advised a variety of regional and national data sharing projects. Dr. Brailer also served for ten years as Chairman and CEO of CareScience, Inc., a leading provider of care management services and Internet-based solutions that help reduce medical errors and improve physician and hospital-based performance. While at CareScience, Dr. Brailer led the company in developing groundbreaking inventions with major research institutions, establishing the nation’s first health care Application Service Provider (ASP) and creating a care management business process outsourcing partnership that allowed hospitals to outsource their care management functions on an at-risk basis. Dr. Brailer also designed and oversaw the development of one of the first community-based health information exchanges in Santa Barbara County, California.

Dr. Brailer holds doctoral degrees in both medicine and economics. He earned his MD at West Virginia University and his PhD in managerial economics at The Wharton School.

Wendy Everett, ScD
President
New England Healthcare Institute

Wendy Everett, ScD, was appointed as the first President of the New England Healthcare Institute (NEHI) in July 2002. NEHI was established to identify realistic strategies for improving healthcare quality while reducing healthcare costs. Everett directs a team that conducts independent research leading to evidence-based public and private health policy recommendations. With over thirty years of experience in the healthcare field, she brings a unique perspective to NEHI. Everett has held executive positions at the University of California, San Francisco Medical Center (UCSF) and at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston. In the 1980s, she directed a national demonstration program for The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and subsequently was the Program Director for the national program in health promotion and disease prevention for the Kaiser Family Foundation. In the mid 1990s, she became a Director of the Institute for the Future, overseeing the creation of ten-year, national forecasts in health/healthcare. She is a Trustee of many healthcare and philanthropic boards.

Everett holds two bachelor of science degrees and master's and doctoral degrees in health policy and management from Harvard University.

Rick Friedman
Director, Division of State Systems
Center for Medicaid and State Operations, CMS
U.S. Department of Health & Human Services

Rick Friedman is responsible for developing and overseeing the federal Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services’ funding policies for automated claims processing and information retrieval systems used by all States to administer their respective Medicaid programs. These systems vary widely from claims processing and decision support systems to data warehouses and eligibility determination systems.

Together with the federal Regional Office Medicaid systems staff, his Division reviews and approves state requests for federal funding for these systems, certifies new Medicaid Management Information Systems (MMIS), and develops national funding policies for the MMIS. He also directs CMS’ Medicaid systems involvement with HIPAA, and is leading a major initiative to redefine the national Medicaid IT Architecture (MITA) based on a patient-centric, enterprise-wide, service oriented architecture.

Prior to CMS, he worked in the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Health, the U.S. Public Health Service, and in the private sector for Booz, Allen & Hamilton and Citicorp. He holds a BA in Economics from Colgate and an MBA from Dartmouth College.

John Glaser
Vice-President and CIO
Partners Healthcare

John Glaser is Vice-President and CIO at Partners HealthCare. Previously, he was Vice-President, Information Systems at Brigham and Women’s Hospital. Glaser managed the Healthcare Information Systems consulting practice at Arthur D. Little. He was the founding Chairman of CHIME and is past President of HIMSS. Glaser is currently the President of the eHealth Initiative Board.

Glaser is a fellow of HIMSS, CHIME, and ACMI, and has been awarded the John Gall award for healthcare CIO of the year. He was also a recipient of CIO Magazine’s 20/20 Vision Award. Glaser holds a PhD in Healthcare Information Systems from the University of Minnesota.

John D. Halamka, MD, MS
Chief Information Officer
CareGroup Health System

John D. Halamka, MD, MS, is Chief Information Officer of the CareGroup Health System, Chief Information Officer and Associate Dean for Educational Technology at Harvard Medical School, Chairman of the New England Health Electronic Data Interchange Network (NEHEN), Acting CEO of MA-Share, Chief Information Officer of the Harvard Clinical Research Institute, Chair of Health Information Technology Standards Panel (HITSP), and a practicing emergency physician.

As CIO at CareGroup, Halamka is responsible for all clinical, financial, administrative, and academic information technology serving 3000 doctors, 12000 employees and one million patients. As CIO and Associate Dean for Educational Technology at Harvard Medical School, he oversees all educational, research and administrative computing for 18,000 faculty and 3,000 students. As Chairman of NEHEN, Halamka oversees the administrative data exchange in Massachusetts. As CEO of MA-Share, he oversees the clinical data exchange efforts in Massachusetts. As Chair of HITSP, Halamka coordinates the process of electronic standards harmonization among all the stakeholders nationwide.

Alan M. Harvey, MD, MBA
President 2005-2006
Massachusetts Medical Society

Alan M. Harvey, MD, MBA, is president of the Massachusetts Medical Society. He is the Director of Quality Assurance, Quality Improvement and Patient Safety, Department of Anesthesiology, Perioperative and Pain Medicine, Brigham and Women’s Hospital/Harvard Medical School. He is a diplomat of the American Board of Anesthesiology, American Board of Pain Medicine, and the American Board of Medical Management.

Dr. Harvey also has extensive experience in health policy, health care finance, and physician payment policy, serving five years on the American Medical Association/Health Care Finance Administration Relative Value Update (RUC) Advisory Committee. He recently served as Chair of the first statewide taskforce on Weight Loss Surgery at the Betsy Lehman Center for Patient Safety and Medical Error Reduction. He also holds an MBA, with an additional concentration in health systems management, from the University of Connecticut.

Linda K. Kenney
President and Founder
Medically Induced Trauma Support Services, Inc. (MITSS)

Linda K. Kenney is President and Founder of Medically Induced Trauma Support Services, Inc. (MITSS). She founded MITSS in 2002 as the result of a personal experience with medical trauma, and is an activist for patient, family, and clinician rights; an educator and public speaker on patient safety; a board member of the Massachusetts Coalition for the Prevention of Medical Errors; and a board member of Consumers Advancing Patient Safety. She is also on the Planning Committee for the 2006 National Patient Safety Foundation Congress.

Through her work at MITSS, Kenney has identified the need for support services in cases of adverse events and outlined an agenda for change. She is currently involved in extensive outreach regarding the need for and availability of MITSS services, speaking at various forums on the topic, providing therapeutic groups for patients and family members, and enlisting the participation of various medical disciplines.

In addition to being a presenter and panelists at numerous conferences on patient safety and medical error prevention, Kenney cowrote the article, “To Err is Human; The Need for Trauma Support Is, Too; A Story of the Power of Patient/Physician Partnership After a Sentinel Event,” with Dr. Frederick van Pelt. The article appeared in the January/February 2005 edition of Patient Safety & Quality Healthcare.

Dale M. Lodge
President and CEO
Winchester Hospital

Dale M. Lodge has been President and CEO of Winchester Hospital since 1998. Prior to joining Winchester, he was Senior Vice President of Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Massachusetts and was responsible for managing all hospital and physician relations throughout the state. Lodge served as Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer at Leonard Morse Hospital and was Chief Executive Officer of their physician organization. He also held administrative positions at the Brigham and Women’s and Beth Israel Hospitals.

Lodge is a member of the Executive Committee and the Board of Directors of the Massachusetts Hospital Association, President of the Massachusetts Council of Community Hospitals, Board Member of Yankee Alliance, Board Member of the Massachusetts eHealth Collaborative, a member of the Massachusetts Business Roundtable's Committee on Healthcare, and a member of the American Hospital Association’s Task Force on Delivery System Fragmentation.

Janet Marchibroda
Chief Executive Officer
eHealth Initiative

Janet Marchibroda, MBA leads the eHealth Initiative and its Foundation as Chief Executive Officer. Marchibroda also serves as the Executive Director of Connecting for Health, a public-private sector initiative funded and led by the Markle Foundation and supported by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation which is designed to catalyze actions on a national basis to create an interconnected, electronic health information infrastructure. Prior to the eHealth Initiative, Marchibroda co-founded and served as Chief Operating Officer for two health care information organizations, one which focuses on providing patient safety and compliance information to physicians and the other—a Bertelsmann AG subsidiary—which focuses on providing electronic publishing services to the payer community to better meet consumer information needs. She also served as the interim Chief Operating Officer for the National Coalition for Cancer Survivorship (NCCS).

Prior to NCCS, Marchibroda served as the Chief Operating Officer of the National Committee for Quality Assurance, an organization devoted to evaluating and improving the quality of health care for Americans—where she was responsible for accreditation of healthcare organizations; certification of healthcare information services; development and delivery of education programs; development of the national healthcare quality measures (HEDIS) database and related report cards and other information products; and administrative functions such as strategic planning, human resources, finance, development and administration. She holds a B.S. in Commerce from the University of Virginia and an MBA with a concentration in organization development from George Washington University.

David Merritt
Project Director
Gingrich Group and the Center for Health Transformation

David Merritt is a project director at the Gingrich Group and the Center for Health Transformation, a collaboration of public and private sector leaders working to transform health and healthcare in America. He leads projects on Health Information Technology, the Uninsured, and Consumer-Driven Healthcare at the Center. He is active in member services, business development, and client management.

Merritt works extensively with Congressional offices, the administration, the media, and private sector leaders to bring fundamental change to our healthcare system. He is widely quoted in trade and national press, including United Press International, Business Week, and MSNBC, and is a frequent speaker with Center members, as well as with state and industry leaders, such as the Southern Governors Association and the Georgia eHealth Summit. His work has been published in the Chicago Tribune, Miami Herald, Healthcare Technology, and on RealClearPolitics.com.

Timothy R. Murphy
Secretary
Executive Office of Health and Human Services

Timothy R. Murphy was sworn in as Secretary of the Executive Office of Health and Human Services on July 14, 2005. In this capacity, he oversees the delivery of programs and services of 17 agencies to over one million of the state’s most needy citizens. Prior to joining EOHHS, Murphy was Governor Romney’s Director of Policy where he most recently focused on the Governor’s healthcare, job stimulus and transportation agendas. Previously, he was the Director of Capital with the Executive Office for Administration and Finance, where he advised the Governor and the Secretary on the Commonwealth’s capital investment programs and debt policies.

Prior to joining the Romney Administration, Murphy was a Vice President in the Investment Banking Division of J.P. Morgan in New York City, advising and raising capital for corporations and non-for-profit institutions. He has structured and executed security offerings for healthcare providers, provided buy-side analysis for hospital management companies, and has authored equity research reports on healthcare companies.

Murphy also served as legislative aide and budget analyst for the Massachusetts Senate Committee on Ways and Means under the chairmanship of Senator Patricia McGovern. He holds a BA from Merrimack College and a Master in Public Policy from Harvard University.

Micky Tripathi
President and CEO
Massachusetts eHealth Collaborative

Micky Tripathi is the President and Chief Executive Officer of the Massachusetts eHealth Collaborative (MAeHC), a non-profit collaboration of 34 leading Massachusetts organizations. He is also a member of the Board of Directors of MA-SHARE, a community utility service for state-wide clinical data exchange in Massachusetts.

Prior to joining MAeHC, Tripathi was a manager in the Boston office of the Boston Consulting Group, a leading strategy and management consulting firm. While at BCG, he served as the founding President and CEO of the Indiana Health Information Exchange, an Indianapolis-based non-profit company partnered with the Regenstrief Institute to create a state-wide health information infrastructure in the state of Indiana. As a manager in BCG’s health care practice, Tripathi also served a variety of US and international clients in the non-profit sector as well as in the bioinformatics, biotechnology, and pharmaceutical industries.

He holds a PhD in political science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, a Master of Public Policy from Harvard University, and an AB in political science from Vassar College. Prior to earning his PhD, he was a senior operations research analyst in the Office of the Secretary of Defense in Washington, DC, for which he received the Secretary of Defense Distinguished Civilian Service Award.

Frederick van Pelt, MD/MBA
Brigham and Women’s Hospital

Dr. Frederick van Pelt attended Amherst College and the University of Massachusetts Medical School. After spending a year as a research fellow at the National Institutes of Health, he spent two years as a surgical resident before transitioning into and finishing a residency and fellowship in anesthesiology at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital. During his medical training, Dr. van Pelt developed a strong interest in improving patient care and service, and went on to attend Harvard Business School with a focus on leadership in healthcare innovation. Since completing his MBA in 1999, Dr. van Pelt has assumed leadership roles in healthcare improvement initiatives, especially in the area of patient safety. He is currently on staff at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital serving in both clinical and administrative leadership capacities. He is Chairman of the Board of Directors for MITSS (Medically Induced Trauma Support Services).

Wendy Warring
Executive Vice President
UMass Memorial Health Care, Inc.

Wendy Warring is Executive Vice President of UMass Memorial Health Care, Inc., Central Massachusetts’ largest not-for-profit health care delivery system and the clinical partner of the University of Massachusetts Medical School. UMass Memorial’s comprehensive network of care includes teaching hospitals, member and affiliated community hospitals, freestanding primary care practices, ambulatory outpatient clinics, long-term care facilities, home health agencies, hospice programs, a rehabilitation group and mental health services. As Executive Vice President, Warring is responsible for integration of the system’s operations, IS strategies and operations, facilities and supply chain management issues, as well as federal and state government revenue and health care reform issues. Much of her work is also directed toward advancing the system’s public mission and partnership with the state’s only publicly owned Medical School.

Warring serves as a director of the Massachusetts Medicaid Policy Institute established by the Blue Cross/Blue Shield Foundation of Massachusetts. Warring is a member of the Board of Directors of VHA Northeast, LLC, and the Massachusetts eHealth Collaborative. She is currently working on the formation of a non-profit corporation in Central Massachusetts with Fallon Clinic and Fallon Community Health Plan to establish a regional information organization. Until last month, she also served as the Chair of the Network Health Board of Directors, the managed care plan owned by Cambridge Health Alliance.

Before joining UMass Memorial, Warring was Commissioner of the Division of Medical Assistance (DMA), formerly the single state agency responsible for Medicaid for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. In this post, she served on the Executive Committee of the National Association of State Medicaid Directors (NASMD) and chaired the Medicaid and Medicare Technical Advisory Group (TAG).

Anthony D. Whittemore, MD
Chief Medical Officer
Brigham and Women’s Hospital

Dr. Anthony D. Whittemore is Chief Medical Officer of Brigham and Women’s Hospital. He has served as Chairman of the Medical Staff Executive and Quality Assurance/Risk Management Committees, as well as Director of the multidisciplinary BWH Vascular Center. Dr. Whittemore has also served as Chief of the Division of Vascular Surgery at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Vice-Chair of the Department of Surgery, among other positions. He is Professor of Surgery at Harvard Medical School.

Dr. Whittemore maintains an active surgical practice, currently focused on aortic arterial reconstruction. He is a member of 20 professional societies, including the American Medical Association, and the American College of Surgeons, and has served as President of the Boston Surgical Society, New England Society for Vascular Surgery, and the Society for Vascular Surgery. He has served as Treasurer of the American Surgical Association and its Foundation, and is currently Secretary-General of the International Federation of Vascular Societies. His publications exceed 100 peer-reviewed scientific papers and an equal number of textbook chapters and educationally relevant material. He served on the editorial boards of numerous publications.

Dr. Whittemore received his medical degree from Columbia University, College of Physicians & Surgeons, and completed his general surgical training in New York City at Columbia-Presbyterian Medical Center.

Charlotte S. Yeh, MD, FACEP
Regional Administrator
Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, Region 1

Dr. Charlotte S. Yeh is the Regional Administrator for the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) in Region I, based in Boston.  CMS, an agency within the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, administers Medicare, Medicaid, and the State Children's Health Insurance Program.  Dr. Yeh, who is board certified in emergency medicine, is responsible for guiding and coordinating policies for the three programs in the region, which includes the six New England states.

Dr. Yeh was formerly the medical director for Medicare policy for National Heritage Insurance Co. in Hingham, Mass., and worked for more than 20 years as an emergency physician in both clinical and administrative areas.  She served for eight years as the physician-in-chief of the emergency department at New England Medical Center in Boston.  In this role, she helped establish the first academic Department of Emergency Medicine at Tufts University Medical School in Boston.

Dr. Yeh has been a member of the Boards of Trustees of the American Hospital Association and the Massachusetts Hospital Association, and she chaired the Massachusetts Trauma Committee, which is responsible for planning the statewide trauma system.  She has lectured frequently on blending clinical practice with the legal requirements of the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act (EMTALA), which guarantees access to emergency care.