Speaking Faculty

Rob Andrews currently serves as the CEO of the Health Transformation Alliance (HTA).

As CEO of the HTA, Andrews oversees the strategic direction of 50 major corporations who have come together in an alliance to do one thing: fix our broken healthcare system. Formed by 4 founding members in September 2015, the HTA has grown to include 50 of our nation’s leading employers, who collectively are responsible for more than 7 million employees, dependents and retirees and an annual health care spend of $26 billion. Through Andrews’ leadership, the HTA has launched value-driven solutions specifically designed to improve patient care and economic value through world class data & analytics, pathbreaking pharmaceutical solutions, high quality medical networks and robust consumer engagement initiatives.

Andrews previously led the Government Affairs practice at Dilworth Paxson law firm for two years before joining the HTA.

Prior to private practice, Andrews served as a Member of the United States House of Representatives for nearly 24 years. Upon his departure from the Congress, President Barack Obama praised Andrews’ service as “an original author of the Affordable Care Act...and a vital partner in its passage and implementation,” and cited his “tenacity and skill” in representing the people of New Jersey.

Andrews is married to Camille Spinello Andrews, an Associate Dean at Rutgers Law School and former Dilworth partner, and they have two daughters, Jacquelyn and Josie.

During his time in the U.S. House, Andrews was a Member of the House of Democratic Leadership as Co-Chairman of the Steering Policy Committee; Senior Democratic Member and former Chairman of the Health, Employment, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Subcommittee of the House Committee on Education and the Workforce; Senior member of the House Armed Services Committee, with responsibility for all national defense matters; Senior Democratic member and the former Chairman of the Defense Committee Panel on Defense Procurement Reform; Senior Democratic member and former Chairman of the Defense Committee Panel on Audit of the Pentagon; Participant, White House Summit on Health Care Reforms (2009 and 2010); One of the Original Authors of the Affordable Care Act; One of the original authors of the Defense Procurement Reform Law (2009); and he holds the record for the highest number of votes ever received by a U.S. House candidate in the history of the state of New Jersey.

Andrews’ professional and community activities include his time as former Director of Camden County Board of Chosen Freeholders.

Andrews has been a keynote speaker at charitable, educational and governmental events for 30 years, including: Bucknell University commencement; Rutgers Law School commencement; and Rutgers Camden commencement. He is a frequent guest on CNN, Fox News, MSNBC and CNBC.

Dr. Antoniou is the Medical Director of Healthworx, the corporate venture and corporate development arm of CareFirst BCBS. Prior to joining Healthworx, Dr. Antoniou was the Chief Medical Officer and Director of Strategy at BlockMedx, a blockchain and analytics startup, and a healthcare analytics Management Consultant at McKinsey & Company. Dr. Antoniou is a board-certified physician with clinical training in Nuclear Medicine and Clinical Informatics from Johns Hopkins Hospital.

Dr. Jordan Asher is Senior Vice President and Chief Physician Executive at Sentara Healthcare. His role concentrates on creating innovative models of care delivery as well as providing national thought leadership directed towards the future of health care.

Dr. Asher is dedicated to championing quality, fostering clinical effectiveness and further cultivating a culture of excellence in the delivery of clinical services across the continuum of care. He oversees system-wide Clinical Quality and Safety, Clinical Effectiveness, the Sentara Quality Care Network (SQCN), the High Performance Design process, Health Equity, Telehealth and Clinical Performance Improvement initiatives.

Previous Experience

Before joining Sentara Healthcare, Jordan served as Chief Clinical Officer for Ascension Care Management (ACM), a subsidiary of Ascension. Prior to ACM, Jordan was Physician Network Executive for Saint Thomas Health in Nashville, where he led the implementation and design of physician alignment strategies. In addition, Dr. Asher served as the Assistant Dean and Interim Clinical Chair of Medicine at the University of Tennessee Health Sciences Center. In this role, he forged a partnership between Saint Thomas Health and the university to establish graduate medical residency programs in several areas including internal medicine, general surgery and emergency medicine. He also served as Medical Director for a large private practice, incorporating multiple specialties while practicing internal medicine specializing in hypertension.

Current Professional Affiliations

• American Association for Physician Leadership® and the American Society of Hypertension (Member)

Education

• University of Texas, Dallas – Masters of Science in Medial Management
• Aquinas Institute of Theology – Certificate for Catholic Healthcare Ministry Leadership
• Vanderbilt University – M.D
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• Emory University - BS

Sameer leads our system’s information technology services, leveraging his experience as a clinician and IT executive to improve and enable safe, high-quality, and efficient clinical care operations and delivery. His focus is deploying innovative technologies and processes that support the transformation of employee and patient experiences, while building the next generation digital core for our integrated delivery network. Prior to joining Fairview, Sameer served as the Chief Health Information Officer and System Vice President of Enterprise Data Management and Analytics at Sutter Health. Previous roles included Chief Health Information Officer at Intermountain and Chief Medical Information Officer at University of Chicago Medical Center and School of Medicine. He is a national speaker and educator on topics of digital transformation, data and analytics, and innovation. Sameer received his Doctor of Medicine degree from the University of Delhi in India and completed his internal medical residency and served as the chief resident at the University of Oklahoma. He also received training in biomedical informatics at the University of Utah’s School of Medicine.

Leanne Berge, Esq., is the Chief Executive Officer of Community Health Plan of Washington (CHPW) and Community Health Network of Washington (CHNW). CHPW, a not-for-profit organization founded by local community health centers, serves approximately 300,000 members across the state in Medicaid and Medicare programs. CHNW, the governing body for CHPW, is a state-wide network of 20 federally qualified health centers. CHNW’s mission is to improve the health status of its communities through high-quality, affordable, community-based health care to underserved individuals and families.

As a leader in managed care with a focus on public programs, Leanne has long demonstrated a strong commitment to improving outcomes for underserved populations. Prior to taking on her current role in the state of Washington, Leanne served in a number of executive roles in Massachusetts, including Senior Vice President with Commonwealth Care Alliance (CCA), a Special Needs Plan serving complex populations in Massachusetts, where she launched and led the One Care program for dually eligible members under the ACA. Prior to her work with CCA, Leanne held executive leadership roles with Network Health, a provider-sponsored MMCO Plan, and Harvard Pilgrim Health Care, a top-performing NCQA health plan. She also served as COO for a high performing Accountable Care Organization (Mt. Auburn Independent Practice Association) where she focused on improving the performance of its Medicare population. Leanne earned a J.D. degree from Georgetown University and holds a bachelor’s degree in politics from Brandeis University.

Since 2008, Leah Binder has served as President & CEO of The Leapfrog Group, an award-winning national nonprofit based in Washington, D.C., representing employers and other purchasers of health care calling for improved safety and quality in hospitals. She is a regular contributor to Forbes.com and other publications, and consistently cited among the most influential people and top women in healthcare and patient safety.

Under her leadership, The Leapfrog Group launched the Hospital Safety Grade, which assigns letter grades on the safety of general hospitals across the country. She fostered groundbreaking innovation in transparency and payment policy through the annual Leapfrog Hospital Survey, which sets high standards for hospital quality and publicly reports information available from no other source. In 2020 Leapfrog will begin rating outpatient surgery and Ambulatory Surgery Centers as well. Leapfrog’s leadership is widely credited as key to significant advances in health care delivery and health value. Analysts find that at least 40,000 lives have been saved in each of the past two years from the galvanizing focus on safety brought by the Hospital Safety Grade. Other movements sparked and spurred by Leapfrog under Leah’s leadereship include reductions in early elective deliveries and other maternity improvements, improvements in medication safety, reductions in infections, and the acceleration of health care transparency.

Leah is a frequent speaker at events across the country. She serves on numerous national boards and advisory committees such as the National Alliance of Healthcare Purchasing Coalitions, AARP’s Champions for Nursing, the National Board of Medical Examiners, the NQF MAP Coordinating Council, and Knowledge To Practice.

Before joining Leapfrog, Leah was vice president for the nationally noted Franklin Community Health Network in Farmington, Maine; and prior to that served as senior policy advisor in the Office of Mayor Rudolph Giuliani in New York City. An initiative she assisted with in New York allowed small businesses to offer more health plan choice to their employees, and that is still in successful operation today at the Northeast Business Group on Health.

She started her career doing public policy and communications for the National League for Nursing. She has a bachelor’s in Politics from Brandeis and two master’s degrees from University of Pennsylvania, one from the Annenberg School for Communications and the other from the Fels Institute of Government. She lives near Washington, DC, with her husband, Sam, and two children, Henry, 21, and K.C., 12.

Mary Caffrey has been with The American Journal of Managed Care (AJMC) editorial team for seven years. She primarily serves as Managing Editor for Evidence-Based Diabetes Management and Evidence-Based Oncology, two indexed publications that reach multi-stakeholder audiences and discuss how decisions by payers and pharmacy benefit managers affect outcomes in diabetes and cancer care. Mary is an award-winning journalist who has also worked for Princeton University and in senior policy and communication roles for several New Jersey government agencies. For AJMC, she covers major scientific meetings in diabetes, cardiology, and oncology and was a participant in the d17 Executive Innovation Lab hosted by the diaTribe Foundation. Her healthcare coverage is shaped by her family’s relocation from a working class suburb in the Northeast to Pascagoula, Mississippi, in the 1980s. Mary later graduated from Loyola University New Orleans. She is especially interested in covering research about prevention, medication adherence, the relationship between behavioral change and chronic disease management, and the challenge of improving population health among the poor and underserved.

Mark Caron is the Chief Executive Officer of Geneia and Executive Vice-President of Business Platforms and Systems at Capital BlueCross. He has more than 30 years of business and technology expertise with more than 25 years in health care traversing both health care delivery systems and health insurers.

His experience also includes senior leadership roles as the CIO of the Collaborative Care division of OptumHealth, Senior Vice President & CIO at Blue Cross Blue Shield of Wisconsin, Senior Vice President & CIO of Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts, Chief Technology Officer at Catholic Health Initiatives (a 78 hospital system), and Vice President of Information Systems at Healthsource.

He earned a bachelor‘s degree in Computer Science from Franklin Pierce College and has a MBA and a master’s degree in Computer Information Systems from Southern New Hampshire University. He is a fellow of the American College of Healthcare Executives (FACHE), certified as a Healthcare Chief Information Officer through the College of Healthcare Information Executives, and is a member of the College of Healthcare Information Management Executives (CHIME) and of the Healthcare Information Management and Systems Society (HIMSS).

Dr. James Colbert is Senior Medical Director for Delivery System Innovation and Analytics at Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts (BCBSMA). He is the clinical leader for provider analytics and provider performance support within BCBSMA. He is responsible for engaging with at-risk provider organizations to enable them to achieve success within their value-based contracts through managing TME and improving quality. He represents BCBSMA on the Board of Directors of the Healthcare Transformation Taskforce.

Prior to joining BCBSMA, he served as the VP of Population Health for Benevera Health, a joint venture between Harvard Pilgrim Health Care and four health delivery systems in New Hampshire. Other experiences include serving as Senior Medical Director for Population Health at Verisk Health and serving as a core faculty member of the Brookings Institution ACO Learning Network. He was the lead author of a 2014 Brookings Institution report entitled Adopting Accountable Care: An Implementation Guide for Physician Practices.

He received his bachelor’s degree from Harvard College and medical degree from Stanford University. He completed a primary care internal medicine residency at Brigham and Women’s Hospital as well as a fellowship in medical research and health policy at the New England Journal of Medicine. Dr. Colbert maintains an active clinical practice, and he holds faculty appointments at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Ariadne Labs, and Harvard Medical School. In 2015 he was selected by MedTech Boston as one of 40 healthcare innovators under age 40. He lives in Jamaica Plain, MA with his wife and daughter.

Ceci Connolly is president and CEO of the Alliance of Community Health Plans (ACHP), the trade association for high-quality, nonprofit, community health plans. Connolly is a passionate advocate for a community-based approach to health care and a strong proponent of payer-provider collaboration. Formerly a national correspondent for The Washington Post and a leader at international consulting firm PwC, Connolly provides a comprehensive perspective on the American health care system from the everyday struggles of physicians and patients to the intricacies of health care politics. Coauthor of LANDMARK: The Inside Story of America’s Health Law and What it Means for Us All, Connolly has been published in the New England Journal of Medicine, The Hill and Morning Consult, among others, and is a contributor on NPR, PBS and Fox. She is a founding member of Women of Impact for Healthcare, and a graduate of Boston College.

Laurie Cooke is the president and CEO of the HBA. Laurie is a dedicated advocate for gender parity, speaker, thought leader, PharmaVOICE 100 most inspiring people in life sciences and ASAE Mentor of the Year. Laurie served on PMI’s executive management team; and prior to nonprofit management work, she served in increasing senior roles ex-US with Hoechst, Hoechst Roussel, Hoechst Marion Roussel, and Aventis working across all pre-clinical to post approval areas including phase I biometrics, project management, process improvement, and late stage team effectiveness. Laurie began her career as a head hospital pharmacist in Washington State. Laurie graduated with a degree in microbiology from University of Maryland, advanced scientific degree in pharmacy from University of Washington, masters in Software Engineering Management from University of Luton, England. She is a licensed pharmacist and certified association executive. Laurie has lived and worked in Europe, New Zealand and both U.S., coasts and currently lives in the Philadelphia main line with her husband and four active pets.

Heather Cox is the Chief Digital Health and Analytics Officer for Humana. In this role, Heather is accountable for building Humana’s digital care delivery operations and leading enterprise analytics. Integrating these critical capabilities across the organization will further accelerate Humana’s move toward differentiated experiences for its health plan members at the intersection of healthcare and lifestyle, tailored especially to the needs of seniors.

Prior to joining Humana, Heather served as Chief Technology and Digital Officer at USAA, where she led the teams responsible for designing and building personalized and digitally enabled end-to-end experiences for USAA members. Heather has also served as CEO of Citi FinTech at Citigroup, helping the company adapt to a future dominated by mobile technology. Before that she headed Card Operations for Capital One, reshaping customer and digital experience for Capital One cardholders.

Heather was named by American Banker magazine as the #3 Woman to Watch nationally in banking in October 2017. She was also named to American Banker’s Women to Watch list in 2011, 2013 and 2016. In 2015, she was named one of the 10 Most Innovative CEOs in Banking by Bank Innovation, as well as Digital Banker of the Year by American Banker.

In March 2018, Heather was appointed to the NRG Energy Board of Directors. She serves on the Nominating and Governance and the Compensation committees. In addition, Heather serves on the national board of directors for LIFT, a nonprofit organization whose mission is to permanently lift people out of poverty.

Heather graduated cum laude with a Bachelor of Arts in Economics from the University of Illinois at Urbana- Champaign. She and her husband Chris are the parents of two daughters, Lea and Victoria. Heather and Chris share a passion for boating and are avid Washington Nationals fans.

As President and Chief Executive Officer of Northwest Permanente, P.C. Imelda Dacones, MD, leads more than 1,700 physicians, clinicians and administrators at the largest independent, physician-led, multi-specialty professional corporation in Oregon and southwest Washington. Together, these physicians deliver Permanente Medicine— evidence- and value-based health care with humanity— to more than 600,000 Kaiser Permanente members. Dr. Dacones is a passionate advocate for addressing the social and environmental determinants of health, and is working to transform the culture, practice, and business of medicine. Under her leadership, Northwest Permanente became the world’s first physician group certified as a B Corp – a status that underscores a strong corporate commitment to use business as a force for good.

Recently-elected as chair of The Permanente Federation's National Permanente Executive Committee, Dr. Dacones has responsibility for the people of The Permanente Federation. As a member of the Board of Directors of the new Kaiser Permanente School of Medicine, she looks to influence the medical education of future generations of physicians in this country, inspiring them to spread the mission of providing high-quality, affordable health care and improving the health of people and our communities.

Renee is serving as the Vice President of Quality and Safety for The Johns Hopkins Hospital (JHH), Johns Hopkins Health System (JHHS) and the Armstrong Institute for Patient Safety and Quality (AI). In these roles, she works with leadership on developing the strategic direction for quality and safety, maximizing organizational improvement, efficiencies and the equity and value of health care delivery. She has been instrumental with the development of an operating management system for quality and safety based on high reliability principles. Her focus has been on clinical quality improvement, using innovation, data analytics with predictive algorithms and advancing performance using a variety of tools and techniques. Specifically, amongst other projects, she leads the strategic design and implementation of Johns Hopkins Medicine’s National Leader Strategy, a campaign to achieve national leader performance on publicly reported measures of patient safety and quality. Using Lean Sigma and other performance improvement tools, this effort led Johns Hopkins Health System affiliated hospitals to win multiple recognitions, including the Joint Commission Top Performer and Delmarva Excellence Awards.

In addition, she evaluates quality measurement methodology to ensure that methodology design for public reporting and pay for performance is evidence-based and aligns with scientific principles. She also co-leads value of care through standardized work to reduce unnecessary variation in care through clinical pathways across JHHS.

Renee led the Revenue Recovery initiative that was successful in driving outcomes with over $100 million return over a 10-year period. She has been a Johns Hopkins employee for 31 years. She has an MSW from the University of Maryland School of Social Work and an MBA from the Johns Hopkins University Business of Medicine Program.

After nearly 12 years of service as president of the Texas A&M Health Science Center (TAMHSC) and vice chancellor for health affairs for The Texas A&M University System (January 2002 through October 2012), Dr. Nancy W. Dickey returned to the College of Medicine where she serves a number of roles both academic and administrative. During her tenure, the health science center grew the number of programs and number of graduates, expanded its research programs, and extended its service to the citizens of Texas.

Currently, she serves as executive director of the Rural and Community Health Institute working with physicians and hospitals across the state of Texas and the nation to facilitate best practices in patient safety, enhanced quality of care, and physician excellence and demonstrating the importance of translation of sound policy and evidence based medicine across the spectrum of practice sites and care delivery.

Other roles at A&M include service as interim dean of the TAMHSC-College of Medicine (June 2000 until Dec. 31, 2001) and founding director of the TAMU Family Medicine Residency. Dr. Dickey was the first woman elected president of the American Medical Association. She is the recipient of numerous awards: American Academy of Family Medicine John G. Walsh Award for Lifetime Contributions to Family Medicine (2019), Institute of Medicine (2007), Texas’s Women’s Hall of Fame (2010), and six honorary doctorate degrees.

Dr. Daniel Durand is the Chief Innovation Officer (CINO) for LifeBridge Health (LBH) in Baltimore, Maryland, a $2.5B health system serving over one million patients. Dr. Durand is accountable for overseeing all LBH work related to biomedical research, digital health, and value-based contracting. He also continues to practice medicine as the Chairman of Radiology across LBH.

From 2016 to 2018, Dr. Durand served as the Medical and Operational Director of the LifeBridge Health Accountable Care Organization (ACO) LLC, which achieved shared savings in all three years of its first contract with Medicare, making it one of the most financially successful health system led ACOs in the history of the Medicare ACO program. The LBH ACO, LLC also demonstrated excellent quality performance, with scores averaging over 90% over the same time period. In addition, Dr. Durand served as the first Executive Director of the LifeBridge Health Clinically Integrated Network (CIN). Under his leadership, the LifeBridge Health CIN grew to over 500 providers and cared for over 100,000 patients in value-based contracts, which has resulted in over $100 million in savings to date.

Prior to joining LifeBridge, Dr. Durand served as the first Director of Accountable Care for Johns Hopkins Medicine and oversaw operations for the Johns Hopkins Medicine Alliance for Patients, one of the nation’s largest ACOs. Prior to this role, he was part of the executive leadership team at Evolent Health where he helped grow annual revenues from $8 million to $118 million en route to a successful IPO. Prior to Evolent, Dr. Durand worked for McKinsey as an associate working out of the Firm’s Washington, DC office.

His writing has appeared in top journals such as The New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) and the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA). He also sits on various professional and policy committees at the state and national level and is a frequent speaker at conferences and other events on the topic of healthcare innovation.

Tate Erlinger, MD, MPH, transitioned to Ascension Healthcare in 2017 to help lead the Ascension Clinical Research Institute (ACRI) and now serves as the VP of Analytics Development and Strategy for the Ascension Data Science Institute (ADSI). Prior to joining the Ascension National team, Dr. Erlinger oversaw Analytics and Informatics services for Ascension Texas and also served as Chief Medical Officer for the Ascension Texas ACO.

In his current role, Dr. Erlinger oversees teams of analysts examining health economics and quality at the Ascension Enterprise level. He has also served as the State Epidemiologist for Texas and the Chief Analytics Officer and Vice President for Quality Improvement for a Texas-based health plan.

Dr. Erlinger received his undergraduate degree from University of Texas at Austin and his medical degree from the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio. He completed his residency in Internal Medicine at the University of Chicago. Following residency, Dr. Erlinger completed a three-year clinical research fellowship at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine and his Masters in Public Health at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health (MPH). He remained on the Johns Hopkins faculty for an additional five years conducting epidemiologic research in cardiovascular disease, lifestyle modification and population-based analyses of chronic disease.

Dr. Erlinger is currently affiliated faculty of the University of Texas at Austin Dell School of Medicine within Population Health and has been an active volunteer at the Volunteer Health Clinic, serving uninsured adults in the Austin community.

Eric Eskioglu, MD is executive vice president and chief medical officer for Novant Health. In this role, he provides strategic, clinical and cultural leadership to ensure the delivery of high-quality, cost-effective and patient-centered care across Novant Health. Dr. Eskioglu oversees all medical staff and leads the safety and quality teams and initiatives. In addition, he is the leader of 8 Novant Health Clinical Institutes as well as Co-Executive Director for Novant’s Institute of Innovation and Artificial Intelligence.

Dr. Eskioglu joined Novant Health in 2015 as senior vice president of neurosciences. He led the expansion of the neurosciences institute across Novant Health, unifying processes and protocols to ensure a world-class experience for patients. With a history of spearheading the creation of three comprehensive stroke centers, Dr. Eskioglu led Novant Health Presbyterian Medical Center in 2017 to become the first hospital in Charlotte, North Carolina, to earn the Advanced Comprehensive Stroke Center designation. With this designation, Novant Health joined an elite group of healthcare systems, including Johns Hopkins, Kaiser Permanente, and Mayo Clinic as one of only a few healthcare systems in the country to have two robust Advanced Comprehensive Stroke Centers – Novant Health’s other being Novant Health Forsyth Medical Center in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.

Before joining Novant Health, Dr. Eskioglu worked at Physicians Regional Healthcare System in Naples, Florida and served as the executive medical director for the Comprehensive Stroke Center and as the medical director of the neurovascular stroke institute and the Neurointensivist care unit. While in these roles, he led the development of the system’s neurosciences initiative and the establishment of the only comprehensive stroke center in southwest Florida. Despite starting from scratch, he created a regional referral center for complex neurological conditions in only 18 months.

Dr. Eskioglu has also served as the medical director for endovascular/vascular neurosurgery with Cerebrovascular Specialists of Florida, Lee Health in Fort Myers, Florida. Other roles include assistant professor of neurological surgery and assistant professor of neurosurgery and radiology at Vanderbilt University Medical Center in Nashville, Tennessee. His work experience includes being a neurosurgeon at hospitals in Florida, Georgia, and Tennessee. He also is widely published in multiple peer-reviewed scientific journals in the area of cerebrovascular surgery. Before his career in medicine, Dr. Eskioglu worked as an aerospace engineer at the Allied-Signal Aerospace and Boeing, where he participated in Six Sigma and research teams in charge of developing new power sources for the new generation of aircraft. He continues to apply his engineering background in efforts to streamline healthcare, decrease errors, and improve patient satisfaction. He is passionate about data analytics and artificial intelligence in healthcare applications.

Dr. Eskioglu earned his medical degree from the University of Kansas and completed a two-year fellowship at the National Institutes of Health with Pfizer Clinical Research Scholars program, as well as an endovascular/vascular neurosurgery fellowship at the University of Florida. At Vanderbilt University Medical Center, he completed his neurosurgical residency training. Dr. Eskioglu also earned a bachelor’s degree in aerospace and mechanical engineering from the University of Arizona. He is married and has three children.

Joy currently serves as Lilly’s Chief Diversity Officer. In that role, she partners with the company’s CEO and senior leaders to attract top talent, develop future leaders, and ensure that all employees can thrive in an inclusive environment that is as diverse as the communities of patients we serve.

Joy has more than 20 years of leadership experience in both for-profit and nonprofit organizations in various industries. As a dynamic speaker and strategic thought partner, she has presented keynote speeches and workshops in more than 20 countries on five continents. She was recently published in Harvard Business Review. She is a highly sought-after executive coach, helping leaders fulfill their aspirations. She has served on boards for several organizations and was named by Diversity Journal as a Woman Worth Watching, by Healthcare Businesswomen’s Association as a Rising Star, and by Black Enterprise as a Top Executive in Corporate Diversity.

Chris Franciskovich is currently the Director of the Advanced Analytics Team at OSF HealthCare, where he and his team use machine learning, statistical, natural language processing, and data mining methods to construct and deploy industry leading predictive models in a variety of strategic areas. He has more than 10 years of experience working in healthcare and holds a MS in Predictive Analytics from Northwestern University, where he focused on advanced modeling techniques and predictive text mining.

Merrill Friedman leads the Disability Policy Engagement team and advocacy strategy for Anthem, a leading health benefits company serving nearly 74 million people nationwide through its affiliates. She works collaboratively with consumers, advocates and stakeholders to ensure the diverse interests and preferences of older adults, individuals with disabilities, and children involved in child welfare programs inform Anthem’s health benefits approaches and related initiatives. Ms. Friedman also leads the National Advisory Board (NAB) on Improving Health Care Services for Older Adults and People with Disabilities and advances the integration of the NAB's six foundational principles, the independent living philosophy, and principles of self-determination throughout these programs, as well as Anthem’s member interactions and business practices. In addition, she leads strategic partnerships with national and local organizations to advance the development of inclusive public policy.

Previously, Ms. Friedman was interim director at a nonprofit foster care agency serving children and adolescents who experienced severe neglect and physical abuse. She also served as president and chief executive officer of a private organization that owned and operated residential treatment facilities, group homes and home and community based services in several states for adolescents with mental health conditions, substance use disorders, and intellectual disabilities.

Ms. Friedman is a nationally recognized leader in Medicaid, LTSS and health services that reflect the needs and interests of older adults, people with disabilities and children and adolescents. Health program expertise includes disability, aging, drivers of health (SDoH), foster care, mental health and substance use, intellectual and developmental disabilities, and justice involvement. Her extensive experience in program development, strategy, new business growth and operations management informs the innovation and development of home and community-based services and capacity building.

Ms. Friedman has served on numerous national boards and commissions. She was appointed by President Barack Obama to the President’s Committee for People with Intellectual Disabilities and by Governor Jennifer Granholm to the MI Statewide Independent Living Council where she also served as Board Chair. Currently, Ms. Friedman serves on the board of directors for Family Voices, Rebuilding Together, and is a member of the National Academy of Social Insurance (NASI) and the NASUAD MLTSS Institute Advisory Board.

Dan is a Partner at Flare Capital Partners, where he sits on the Board of Somatus, a Flare Capital portfolio company. Prior to joining Flare Capital, Dan served as a Medical Director at the Harvard Pilgrim Health Plan, leading Population Health Analytics, Value Based Purchasing, and General Strategy. Dan is a practicing Internal Medicine Physician on the Faculty of the Massachusetts General Hospital, and has an appointment as an Instructor at Harvard Medical School. Dan currently serves on Massachusetts Governor Charlie Baker’s Board of Nursing Home Administrators.

Previously, Dan spent time as an entrepreneur and operator in the Health IT Industry, cofounding and managing two separate businesses in the Electronic Health Records and Online Medical Education industries.

Dan’s other interests include Healthcare Policy and Global Health. He has served as a Senior Health Policy Advisor for the Campaigns of Governor Charlie Baker and Congressman Joseph Kennedy III. He has worked to expand healthcare infrastructure in the developing world, serving as a consultant for the Clinton Foundation Health Access Initiative (CHAI) in Ethiopia.

Dan earned a B.S. with honors from the University of California, San Diego, an M.D. Summa Cum Laude from the Morehouse School of Medicine, and an M.B.A. from the Harvard Business School. Dan completed his Internal Medicine Residency at the Massachusetts General Hospital.

Mary Grealy is president of the Healthcare Leadership Council, a coalition of chief executives of the nation’s leading health care companies and organizations.  The HLC advocates consumer-centered health care reform, emphasizing the value of private sector innovation.  It is the only health policy advocacy group that represents all sectors of the health care industry.  She was appointed to the position in August 1999.

Ms. Grealy has an extensive background in health care policy.  She has led important initiatives on the uninsured, Medicare reform, improving patient safety and quality, protecting the privacy of patient medical information and reforming the medical liability laws.  She testifies frequently before Congress and federal regulatory agencies.

From 1995 until she began her tenure at HLC, she served as Chief Washington Counsel for the American Hospital Association, a national organization representing all types of hospitals, health systems and health care networks.  In her position, she was responsible for the organization’s legal advocacy before Congress, as well as executive and judicial branches of government.

From 1979 to 1995, Ms. Grealy was Chief Operating Officer and Executive Counsel for the Federation of American Hospitals, a trade association representing 1,700 investor-owned and managed hospitals and health systems.  She coordinated legislative and regulatory policies as well as lobbying activities for the Federation.

Ms. Grealy has a bachelor degree from Michigan State University and a law degree from Duquesne University.  She served on the Board of Directors of TEAMHealth, one of the largest providers of outsourced physician staffing solutions for hospitals in the United States, and the Board of Directors of Duquesne University.  She is a member of the American Health Lawyers Association.  She also serves on the advisory boards of the David A. Winston Health Policy Fellowship, Women Business Leaders in Health and the March of Dimes Public Policy Council.  She is a frequent public speaker on health issues and has been ranked many times by Modern Healthcare as one of the 100 Most Powerful People in Healthcare and has been named to Modern Healthcare’s list of the Top 25 Women in Healthcare.

Robin Hacke is Executive Director of the Center for Community Investment (CCI), which is dedicated to overcoming disinvestment and improving opportunity so that everyone has a fair chance to lead a healthy and productive life. Working with cross-sector partnerships, innovative health institutions and local leaders, CCI helps communities unlock the capital they need to become more cohesive, resilient and environmentally sustainable.

CCI, housed at the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, was incubated during Ms. Hacke’s tenure as a Senior Fellow at The Kresge Foundation. Previously, she served for seven years as Director of Capital Innovation at Living Cities, where she managed capital deployment for the $80 million Integration Initiative and spearheaded creation of the Catalyst Fund. She has served as a Visiting Scholar at the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, a consultant to major foundations and a member of the Steering Committee for the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston’s Working Cities Challenge.

A former venture capitalist and investment banker with more than a decade of community investment experience, Ms. Hacke holds an MBA from Harvard Business School and a BA from Harvard-Radcliffe College. Learn more at www.centerforcommunityinvestment.org.

Jeffrey Hausfeld, M.D., M.B.A., F.A.C.S., has served on the national board and committees of specialty medical societies since beginning his practice in Otolaryngology/Facial Plastic Surgery. He is an Associate Clinical Professor of Surgery at George Washington University School of Health Sciences and an alumnus of the Yale University School of Medicine. Dr. Hausfeld is widely published in the medical literature, is the pioneer of innovative laser surgery techniques, is the author of a lay oriented medical book, and has appeared on numerous local and national television and radio shows as a medical expert. He has also served as a health care consultant, spokesperson, and executive coach for multi-national pharmaceutical companies, health care firms, as well as the U.S. military. Dr. Hausfeld stepped down from his clinical duties after receiving a Masters in Business Administration from Johns Hopkins University. He continued to refine his communication and team building talents by completing a graduate certificate program in Leadership Coaching and Organizational Development at George Washington University.

Dr. Hausfeld led the field in otolaryngology/facial plastic surgery for many years and is now a business operator and entrepreneur. He invests, manages and consults to a variety of healthcare businesses, including assisted living facilities for Alzheimer’s and dementia patients, medical device companies, healthcare information technology and biotech firms, debt collection services for physicians, as well as syndicating and raising capital for health care related real estate ventures, including other life science entrepreneurial enterprises, both regionally and nationally. Dr. Hausfeld is the Chairman of the Board and Chief Medical Officer of BioFactura, a Biotech firm specializing in the production Biosimilars as well as novel biologic drugs. He serves as President of Memory Care Communities LLC, a portfolio of Assisted Living facilities in the Midwest dedicated to the care of Alzheimer’s and dementia care patents. He is the Chairman and Founder of the Society of Physician Entrepreneurs (www.sopenet.org ), a global network focused on educating healthcare and life science professionals in Bioentrepreneurship and Innovation.

Dr Hausfeld invites healthcare professionals to use financial information and the “science of business” as valuable tools to nurture medical innovation at their institutions and private practice, as well as to enhance the ability to promote quality patient care and improve decision-making. Dr. Hausfeld will demonstrate that power, pleasure and improved performance can result from the ability to mesh the cultures of medicine and business in a comprehensive and strategic manner. “The exciting thing about life after the practice of medicine is that now I am able to draw upon the diversified fields of medicine, business, and organizational psychology, and implement novel solutions that have an immediate impact on patients, providers, and on the client’s bottom line”.

Kathleen Herath oversees Nationwide’s Wellbeing and Safety activities for its 30,000 associates across the country. In this role, she is responsible for developing the company’s Integrated Health and Productivity strategy, Occupational Health Services and on-site clinics, Substance Free Workplace, and Associate Safety.

She has 35 years of professional experience in the health care industry. The My Health program at Nationwide has been awarded numerous honors including the IBI Health Innovation Award, the American Heart Association’s Platinum Fit Friendly Employer Award and the prestigious C. Everett Koop National Health Award. In 2014, Nationwide was the first company in the country to receive the US Healthiest Health Lead Gold Medal for improving health outcomes. In 2018, the program won both Top Training Magazine’s Best Practice Award and Optum Health’s Spirit of Innovation Award.

Kathleen has become a frequently requested speaker within the health and productivity industry and has spoken at numerous conferences and seminars on various industry-related topics. She is active in community and national non-profit organizations including Ronald McDonald House Board of Directors and the Great Rivers Strategy Committee for the America Heart Association. She is a past Board Member and President for Equitas Health.

Matthew O. Hurford, M.D. is Chief Medical Officer for Community Care Behavioral Health Organization part of the UPMC Insurance Services Division and one of the country’s largest not-for-profit behavioral health managed care organizations. Headquartered in Pittsburgh, Community Care serves over one million Medicaid beneficiaries across Pennsylvania by facilitating the ongoing evolution of the behavioral health system toward one that embraces the journey of healing, transformation, and empowerment.

As Chief Medical Officer at Community Care, Dr. Hurford is responsible for the clinical and quality operations of Community Care through oversight of the departments of Clinical Management, Psychiatry, Psychology, and Quality Management. He also provides executive leadership for new business opportunities and program development in areas including physical health/behavioral health integration and innovative healthcare payment models.

Prior to joining Community Care, Dr. Hurford served as the Chief Medical Officer of the City of Philadelphia’s Department of Behavioral Health and Intellectual Disability Services (DBHIDS). He has held leadership positions in academic medicine, community mental health and managed care.

Dr. Hurford graduated from Swarthmore College and received his medical degree from Temple University School of Medicine where he was elected into the Alpha Omega Alpha National Honor Medical Society. Following graduation, Dr. Hurford completed his internship and residency in psychiatry at The Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania where he was named Chief Resident. He is currently a Clinical Associate at the University of Pennsylvania Department of Psychiatry's Center for Mental Health Policy and Services Research. His research interests focus on the interface of physical and mental illness as well as the implementation of evidence-based practices.

Dr. Hurford lives in Philadelphia with his wife and four children.

Allen J. Karp is the Executive Vice President of Healthcare Management and Transformation at Horizon BCBSNJ. Mr. Karp has responsibility for Horizon BCBSNJ’s health care value strategy and clinical and network operations. He also leads the pharmacy, behavioral health and health care analytics organizations.

Mr. Karp has over 30 years of health care experience in leading health care delivery and service organizations. His innovative approach to health care delivery models provides experienced leadership as Horizon BCBSNJ leads a transformation away from fee-for-service to a value-based model that rewards doctors and hospitals for quality, cost-effective care and enhanced member experience.

Prior to joining Horizon BCBSNJ, Mr. Karp held senior leadership positions with Coventry Healthcare, Aetna and MedPartners Inc. He served as Senior Vice President at Coventry Healthcare where he led its national network and the development of the company’s Accountable Care Organization (ACO) and high-performance network strategy. He has implemented numerous innovative value-based models with hospitals and physicians in several states. He was also responsible for First Health, a Coventry Healthcare Company providing a national, integrated PPO network.

At Aetna, Mr. Karp held the position of Vice President of Healthcare Delivery, where he developed regional and national network strategy and managed provider contracting, clinical operations and medical economics. Mr. Karp also held the position of President of the Eastern Division for MedPartners where he had responsibility for multiple physician groups and independent practice associations (IPAs) with revenue in excess of $1 billion.

Mr. Karp currently serves on the board of directors for Cota, which builds solutions for health care to analyze, visualize, report and manage real-world evidence and deliver precision medicine. He also serves on Cota’s finance and compensation committees. He is also on the boards of the American Heart Association and the Newark Museum.

In 2018, Mr. Karp was named as a Leader in Health Care in the NJBIZ Vanguard Series for his work in pioneering the implementation of value-based health care in New Jersey.

Mr. Karp earned a bachelor’s degree in Commerce from Rider University and a master’s degree in Business Administration from Wilmington College.

Dr. Daniel Knecht is a board-certified internist currently serving as Vice President of Health Strategy and Innovation at CVS Health. In this role, he collaborates across CVS Health and Aetna business lines to develop and execute clinical innovations that address unmet health needs. Since joining Aetna in 2016, Dr. Knecht has led a series of enterprise-wide strategic initiatives including the company’s efforts to combat opioid misuse and addiction. Following CVS Health’s acquisition of Aetna, his team remains focused on leveraging data analytics to provide actionable insights for patients and providers that increase value of care.

After graduating with honors from Dartmouth College, Dr. Knecht received a joint M.D., M.B.A. from Weill Cornell Medical College and Johnson Graduate School of Management where he was a recipient of the Lee Family Scholarship. As a Fulbright Scholar in medical sciences, he performed research that explored health care deficiencies in the Negev region of Israel. Today, Dr. Knecht is an associate clinical professor at Mount Sinai West in New York City and still sees patients.

Lisa Lilley is currently the Vice President of Ambulatory Quality and Risk for CHRISTUS Health, a not-for-profit, international hospital system. Prior to joining CHRISTUS in 2016, Lisa spent four years at AmerisourceBergen as the nursing and quality leader for the nursing telehealth teams. She has worked with rural and safety net hospital systems for 20+ years, providing care for underserved breast and GYN Oncology patients, and developing and implementing nurse navigation teams for oncology services.

Lisa received her undergraduate degree in nursing and her master’s degree as a Women’s Health Nurse Practitioner from Texas Woman’s University. She is a certified Lean Six Sigma Black belt, a member of the AMGA Quality Council, and Co- Chair of the CHRISTUS Ambulatory Quality and Patient Safety Committee.

Kathy Major is the Executive Director and Vice President of UCHealth Plan Administrators. Kathy says, “As a third party administrator that is part of the UCHealth system of facilities and providers, we have a solid track record of working alongside employers. We do everything we can to leverage our resources in order to assist employers in gaining better control over claims cost, while simultaneously improving the health and wellbeing of their members through increased medical and behavioral health care access.”

Kathy is a seasoned executive with over 30 years of experience in the healthcare industry. She was responsible for the launch of two previous third party administrators within the state of Colorado, and has extensive experience in both managed care and third party administrator environments.

Kathy’s experience in the application of innovative solutions and the management of large scale operations led to a prestigious award from the Smithsonian Institute. She has been a speaker at the Self Insurance Institute of America on multiple occasions and has authored several articles regarding insurance industry topics.

Kathy graduated from the University of Colorado with a finance degree and holds an active Colorado Accident and Health producer license.

Dr. Roger Marshall, Congressman for Kansas' Big 1st District, is a physician, devoted father and husband. He and his wife, Laina, have been married for 36 years and are the parents of four children, and have two grandchildren. As a physician, Dr. Marshall has delivered more than 5000 babies, giving him a deep appreciation for the sanctity of life, and an intimate understanding of the healthcare system.

Marshall graduated from Kansas State University with an undergraduate degree in biochemistry before attending the University of Kansas Medical School. He received his Medical Doctorate in 1987 and moved on to his residency in St. Petersburg, Florida. In his final year of residency, he was not only named Teacher of the Year by all other residents and faculty, but also received the Resident Research Award. Following his residency, he returned to Kansas where he began his practice in Great Bend.

Since coming to Congress to represent Kansas' 1st District, Dr. Marshall has utilized his depth of medical and family experience, and much more. He brings seven years of Army Reserve experience, where he helped train a mobile hospital support unit and rose to the rank of Captain. His life began on a Kansas farm, and he preserves his deep agricultural appreciation and understanding through participating in a cattle feeding operation.

Community has been a pillar of Marshall's life, and is a focus to this day. He is a board member of Farmer's Bank and Trust, the community bank that has served central Kansas for 100 years. He has been an Elder, Deacon, and twice board chair of his church. He has also coached in his community youth sports programs, and spends as much time as possible at Quivera National Wildlife Refuge and Cheyenne Bottoms.

In Congress, Dr. Marshall serves on the House Ag Committee and the Committee on Science, Space and Technology.

Jo Ellen is the National Housing+Health Growth Lead for the UHC Housing+Health programs of United Healthcare. Led by Dr. Jeffery Brenner, former CEO of the Camden Coalition in Camden, New Jersey, Jo Ellen is part of a national specialty work group within United Healthcare focusing on identify housing opportunities for members who are homeless, medically vulnerable, and disconnected from community and family resources.. This investment is aimed at successfully reducing healthcare spend and improving healthcare outcomes. Jo Ellen joined United Healthcare in 2016 and provides expertise around Non-Profit Management and Non-Profit Housing partnerships (financing, operations, and leadership structure), HUD financing and initiatives, Fair Housing, and Business Analytics.

Prior to her work with United Healthcare, Jo Ellen spent more than 20 years in community development and affordable housing work. Her work has included the running Community Development Corporations aligned with community hospitals focused on housing counseling and housing rehab, a transitional housing and drop in center for homeless young adults, and providing large agency leadership for building community relationships, project support, and financing opportunities for affordable housing development and operations.

Jo Ellen’s early work in community development included serving as an grantor and oversight manager of HUD and local initiative funds and supporting initiatives in affordable housing, community economic development, small business support, community safety, and community outreach.

Neil Meltzer is president and CEO of LifeBridge Health, a position he has held since 2013. Mr. Meltzer joined Sinai Hospital of Baltimore as vice president of operations in 1988, and a decade later became Sinai’s president and chief operating officer.

As CEO of LifeBridge Health, Mr. Meltzer has led the system through a period of strategic growth with a mission to transform the organization into an integrated health care delivery system, offering a full spectrum of care. Along with the acquisition of Carroll Hospital in 2015, Mr. Meltzer has expanded the system through key partnerships, including alliances with organizations that provide medical transportation, retail pharmacy, urgent care, health insurance, assisted living and more.

Mr. Meltzer has a background in public health and brings a community-focused approach to every health care decision. He serves on the boards of the Greater Baltimore Committee, Notre Dame of Maryland University, the Maryland Hospital Association, the Hippodrome Foundation and Everyman Theatre. Additionally, Mr. Meltzer serves on the advisory board of the University of Maryland School of Public Health. On the national level, he continues to work with the American Heart Association after serving as national chairman. He was also one of 15 national workforce health care champions appointed by former president, Barack Obama.

Mr. Meltzer earned his Master of Public Health and Health Administration from Tulane University School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine in Louisiana, and his undergraduate degree in public health from the University of Massachusetts Amherst.

Among many honors, the Maryland Daily Record has recognized Mr. Meltzer as an Influential Marylander and a Most Admired CEO and has awarded him its ICON Honor. The Baltimore Business Journal has named Mr. Meltzer as one of its Power 10 CEOs, and, in 2019, the Baltimore Museum of Industry named him “Industrialist of the Year.”

Jason Mitchell, M.D., is the Chief Medical and Clinical Transformation Officer for Presbyterian Healthcare Services, a not-for-profit health care system that is New Mexico’s largest, spanning hospitals, a multi-specialty medical group and a health plan.

While overseeing more than half a billion dollars of fully capitated risk arrangements, Dr. Mitchell also leads delivery system care and case management, organizational quality and accreditation, clinical informatics and enterprise population health. He has shared oversight over health plan clinical and pharmacy operations and co-leads enterprise medical cost management for the more than 650,000 members served through Presbyterian Health Plan.

Dr. Mitchell leads a team of 1,000 employed clinicians across 40+ clinical locations and also has clinical oversight for medical staff operations of nine hospital campuses in a mixed medical staff model.

Dr. Mitchell focuses on redesigning clinical practice at the system level and is transforming the role of the physician executive to better serve clinicians and patients during a time of rapid health care change. He is a key leader in developing enterprise strategy across care delivery, the health plan and Presbyterian’s Fluent Health – a leader in partnering with delivery systems to start or strengthen their own provider-led health plans.

Under Dr. Mitchell’s leadership, Presbyterian is advancing new care models, processes and technology to help connect the care continuum of payers, providers and patients in new ways. These efforts have yielded significant gains in disease management, better patient care and provider experience, and improved medical cost trends and management of population health.

Dr. Mitchell is passionate about the quadruple aim and continues to see patients as a family practice physician. He earned his medical degree from the University of New Mexico, where he also completed his residency in family medicine. Dr. Mitchell is board-certified in both family medicine and clinical informatics. He has been with Presbyterian since 2006.

Dr. Robert Morrow serves as the market president of Houston and Southeast Texas at Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Texas (BCBSTX). He leads the company's statewide efforts on media and public relations, executive communications and influence strategy in coordination with sales and account management, network, policy development, government and community relations. He most recently served as the region’s Chief Medical Officer.

Prior to his time at BCBSTX, Dr. Morrow served as the Director of Medical Quality for the Rural and Community Health Institute of the Texas A&M Health Science Center and was recently asked to sit on their Board of Advisors. His previous experience also includes experience as the Chief Medical Officer for Memorial Hermann Southwest Hospital in Houston and practicing privately in Family Medicine. Dr. Morrow is a graduate of the Memorial Hermann Southwest Family Practice training program in Houston and the University of Texas Medical School at Houston. He completed his undergraduate studies at Texas A&M University and received a Master of Business Administration degree from the University of Tennessee.

Dr. Morrow currently serves on the Board of Directors for the Greater Houston Partnership. As a champion for public health, he is on the Board of Directors for the Houston Division of the Southwest Affiliate of the American Heart Association. He also sits on the Houston Health Connect Board and the Board of Affiliates for the Professional Science & Engineering Master's Program at Rice University. In addition, Dr. Morrow serves as Past Chairman of the Board of the Texas Medical Foundation, Health Quality Institute. He has been an active member of the Texas Medical Association (TMA) throughout his career where his involvement includes serving in a number of leadership positions including: Chair of the Council on Public Health as well as a member of the Councils on Legislation and Medical Education. Currently he serves on the Council on Health Care Quality. Dr. Morrow is a member of the TMA House of Delegates and completed 14 years as a delegate to the American Medical Association (AMA). He also serves on the TMA-Practice Edge LLC Board of Directors. Additionally, Dr. Morrow serves on the Board of Directors of the Caring For Texas Foundation and recently accepted an appointment to the Board for Faith in Practice, an organization that provides year round medical mission work in Guatemala.

Dr. Morrow has been married to his wife, Beth, for over 32 years, and they have two children and three grandchildren.

Seth Moulton was first called to service when he joined the Marines in 2001, days after graduating from college and months before the attacks on 9/11. As the leader of an infantry platoon, he was among the first Americans to reach Baghdad in 2003. He served four tours in a war that he didn’t agree with – but he was proud to go, so no one had to go in his place.

After returning home from Iraq, Seth earned joint degrees in Business and Public Policy at graduate school, and then worked in the private sector in Texas to build the country’s first high speed rail line. But it wasn’t long before he was called to serve once again – this time in his home district in Massachusetts.

Seth ran – and won – on a platform of bringing a new generation of leadership to Washington, becoming the only Democrat to unseat an incumbent in a primary in 2014.

In the two terms since he was first sworn in, Seth has worked tirelessly to uphold his commitment to bipartisanship. He has passed several bipartisan bills, including the Faster Care for Veterans Act and the Modernizing Government Travel Act, and was named the most effective freshman Democrat by the Center for Effective Lawmaking. He has also concentrated on spurring economic development in Massachusetts, creating the first intergovernmental task force focused on growing the economy of Lynn, the biggest city in his district.

Today, as a member of the Budget Committee, Seth is focused on creating a new economic agenda that will make a difference for American families. He also sits on the House Armed Services Committee and is the top Democrat on the Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee.

Seth lives in Salem, Massachusetts with his wife, Elizabeth, and their daughter, Emmy.

Dr. Nazha is the director of the Cleveland Clinic Center of Clinical Artificial Intelligence and an Associate Medical Director at Enterprise Analytics. He is also an Assistant Professor of Medicine at Lerner College of Medicine/Case Western Reserve University and an Associate Staff at the Department of Hematology and Medical Oncology at Taussig Cancer Institute, Cleveland Clinic.

Dr. Nazha completed his Hematology and Medical Oncology fellowship at Cleveland Clinic and a Leukemia Fellowship at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center where he also served as an instructor in the Leukemia Department.

Dr. Nazha is nationally and internationally recognized expert in treating patients with leukemia. His research focuses on using artificial intelligence, machine learning, and deep learning to translate genomic and complex healthcare data into useful clinical tools that can improve patient outcomes. He is also a programmer and has developed multiple machine learning and deep learning models to improve the diagnosis, prognosis, and treatment options for patients with leukemia. He serves as a member of the NCCN guidelines for myelodysplastic syndromes. He is also a member of the International Working Group of MDS/MPN (IWG MDS/MPN), the International Working Group of myelodysplastic syndromes (IWG MDS) and a member in the acute and chronic leukemia committees at the Center for International Blood and Marrow Transplant Research. He is the recipient of several prestigious awards including the NIH K12 Career Development Award, Future Leader in Hematology for Clinical Research Award, the James S. and Suzanne Cyrus Scholar Award Finalist, William E. Lower Non-Clinical Research Award, Peskind Memorial Award for Excellence in Scientific Research, and the Next Generation Innovator Award among many other teaching and service awards.

Dr. Nazha has published more than 80 peer-reviewed manuscripts, review articles, and book chapters. He is on the editorial board of Journal of Clinical Oncology Clinical Informatics, Annals of Hematology & Oncology, Cancer Biology & Medicine, and Cancer Treatment and Research Communications. He is also an ad hoc reviewer for Journal of Clinical Oncology (JCO), JAMA Oncology, Leukemia, British Journal of Hematology, The Oncologist and many others.

Dr. Nazha is a member of the American Society of Hematology, American Society of Clinical Oncology, American Association of Cancer Research, and the American Society of Physicians.

Dr. Kavita Patel is currently the Vice President of Payer and Provider Integration at the Johns Hopkins Health System where she is also a practicing primary care physician. She is also a Fellow at the Brookings Institution. Dr. Patel was previously a Director of Policy for The White House under President Obama and a senior advisor to the late Senator Edward Kennedy. Her prior research in healthcare quality and community approaches to mental illness have earned national recognition and she has published numerous papers and book chapters on healthcare reform and health policy. She has testified before Congress several times and she is a frequent guest expert on NPR, CBS, NBC and MSNBC as well as serving on the editorial board of the journal Health Affairs.

Dr. Robert Pearl is the former CEO of The Permanente Medical Group (1999-2017), the nation’s largest medical group, and former president of The Mid-Atlantic Permanente Medical Group (2009-2017). In these roles he led 10,000 physicians, 38,000 staff and was responsible for the nationally recognized medical care of 5 million Kaiser Permanente members on the west and east coasts. Recently named one of Modern Healthcare’s 50 most influential physician leaders, Pearl is an advocate for the power of integrated, prepaid, technologically advanced and physician-led healthcare delivery.

He serves as a clinical professor of plastic surgery at Stanford University School of Medicine and is on the faculty of the Stanford Graduate School of Business, where he teaches courses on strategy and leadership, and lectures on information technology and health care policy.

In 2017 he authored “Mistreated: Why We think We’re Getting Good Healthcare—And Why We’re Usually Wrong” a Washington Post bestseller that offers a roadmap for transforming American healthcare. All proceeds from the book go to Doctors Without Borders.

As a regular contributor to Forbes, Pearl covers the business of healthcare and the culture of medicine. He’s the host of a new podcast called “Fixing Healthcare,” which debuted in the iTunes top 100 list of science and medicine programs. He has been featured on CBS This Morning, CNBC, NPR, and in TIME, USA Today and Bloomberg News. He has published more than 100 articles in various medical journals and contributed to numerous books. He is a frequent keynote speaker at healthcare and medical technology conferences. Pearl has addressed the Commonwealth Club, the World Healthcare Congress, and the Institute for Healthcare Improvement’s National Quality Forum.

Board certified in plastic and reconstructive surgery, Pearl received his medical degree from the Yale University School of Medicine, followed by a residency in plastic and reconstructive surgery at Stanford University. From 2012 to 2017, Pearl served as chairman of the Council of Accountable Physician Practices (CAPP), which includes the nation’s largest and best multispecialty medical groups, and participated in the Bipartisan Congressional Task Force on Delivery System Reform and Health IT in Washington, D.C.

Connect with Dr. Robert Pearl on Twitter >@RobertPearlMD, LinkedIn and at his website robertpearlmd.com.

Pamela Peele, Ph.D., is the Chief Analytics Officer at UPMC Insurance Services Division and UPMC Enterprises Dr. Peele brings 13 years of direct patient care experience along with 12 years of academic research experience to her position as a leader of health care analytics at UPMC. She is responsible for creating innovative analytics that drive financial and clinical performance including economic modeling, predictive modeling, statistical analysis and machine learning. Prior to joining the UPMC in 2006, Dr. Peele was the Vice Chair of the Department of Health Policy & Management at the University Of Pittsburgh Graduate School Of Public Health. She currently holds faculty appointments in the Graduate School of Public Health and the School of Medicine at the University of Pittsburgh. She is core faculty at the Center for Research on Health Care at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center and an elected fellow of the Centre for Interuniversity Research and Analysis on Organizations in Montreal, Canada. She has numerous published articles and book chapters. She was the first person chosen by IBM as an IBM Big Data Hero and was voted the 2014 IT News Men & Women of the Year as a top innovator in health care analytics.

Dr. Peele has a BA in economics from Roanoke College in Salem, VA, and a MA and a PhD in economics from Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, VA.

Ms. Popwell serves as the Chief Strategy Officer for Ascension Michigan where she is responsible for the strategic direction and alignment of the Ministry Market. Ascension is a faith-based healthcare organization dedicated to transformation through innovation across the continuum of care. As one of the leading non-profit and Catholic health systems in the U.S., Ascension is committed to delivering compassionate, personalized care to all, with special attention to persons living in poverty and those most vulnerable. In FY2018, Ascension provided nearly $2 billion in care of persons living in poverty and other community benefit programs. Ascension includes approximately 156,000 associates and 34,000 aligned providers. The national health system operates more than 2,600 sites of care – including 151 hospitals and more than 50 senior living facilities – in 21 states and the District of Columbia, while providing a variety of services including physician practice management, venture capital investing, investment management, biomedical engineering, facilities management, clinical care management, information services, risk management, and contracting through Ascension’s own group purchasing organization.

Prior to her role with Ascension, Ms. Popwell served as Vice President, Strategy Executive for the Strategic Service Group of Atrium Health. She led the organization wide strategy management process and advised System level executives in her areas of expertise which include: strategic planning, strategy execution, strategic growth, service line planning, portfolio/ project management, and cost management.

Prior to this position, Ms. Popwell was the Chief Ancillary Executive at Carolinas HealthCare System-Cleveland including two hospitals, one nursing home and a long-term acute care hospital (LTACH) in Cleveland County. Ms. Popwell was responsible for all Ancillary and Support Services for CCHS, and she was with the organization for a little over 12 years. During that time, she led the team to award winning quality outcomes, award winning patient satisfaction results, top tier employee engagement results, and successful growth strategies in a turbulent healthcare climate and challenging per capita income community.

Ms. Popwell has been a healthcare professional for over 25 years. Over the course of her career, Ms. Popwell has served as a quality and accreditation senior leader as well as a healthcare consultant specializing in the use of benchmarking and labor productivity data. She is a Fellow of the American College of Healthcare Association as well as a Senior Fellow of the American Leadership Forum (ALF). She is also certified as a Project Management Professional and was honored in 2015 with the Charlotte region’s Top 50 Most Influential Women Award.

John Pyhtila, Ph.D., is the Chief Data and Analytics Officer of the Partners Healthcare System. John is responsible for maximizing the utility of the vast amounts of current and future data available to Partners and enabling innovation through advanced analytics. The Data and Analytics Office drives and implements strategy on enterprise data warehousing, analytic tools, advanced analytics, and data governance & management and measures value delivered through impact on Partners HealthCare System’s critical mission of patient care, research, teaching, and community service.

Prior to joining Partners, John was the Head of Data Science at Cigna Healthcare. In that role, John led the advanced data science team responsible for partnering with business lines to achieve differentiated results through data driven actions. Prior to Cigna, John worked at Verisk Health where he led the Enterprise Analytics Division which provides Software as a Service data warehousing, analytics, and predictive modeling products to payers, providers, and employers. John also spent time at McKinsey & Company supporting clients across multiple industries on both strategy and operations. Early in his career John worked as an engineer for both Hewlett-Packard and Motorola. John has a Bachelor’s degree in Electrical Engineering from Michigan State, a Master’s degree in Electrical Engineering from Stanford and a PhD in Biomedical Engineering from Duke University.

Valinda Rutledge is currently the Vice President, Public Payor Health Strategy in the Care Coordination Institute at Greenville Health System, SC. She is responsible for identifying, analyzing, and supporting the implementation of opportunities related to government initiatives such as Bundled payments, Medicare advantage, Medicaid pilots, Dual Eligible, PCMH, and ACOs.

She previously worked as a founding member of the leadership team (Senior Advisor and Group Director) at the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services Innovation (CMMI) where she helped build the Innovation Center from its startup phase and managed the design and launch of several of the Center's models. In particular, she led the development and rollout of the Bundled Payment for Care Improvement Initiative, Strong Start and other national programs related to care transformation.

Before joining CMS, Ms. Rutledge served as the Chief Executive Officer of several systems including Bon Secours, SSM Health, and CaroMont Health in Gastonia, North Carolina where she led the development of a 210-day bundled knee payment arrangement between CaroMont Health and North Carolina's largest health insurer, Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina.

Ms. Rutledge received the 2013 Becker’s Healthcare Leadership Award, which is given to the top 30 individuals in the nation who demonstrate leadership and impact to the industry on a national level. She currently serves on several National Scientific Advisory Boards including Parkland Center for Clinical Innovation (PCCI) and as a Subject Matter Expert for SG2 (part of Vizient) where she is responsible for assisting in the development of Sg2’s national thought leadership regarding payment transformation.

Ms. Rutledge holds two advanced degrees: a Master of Business Administration degree from Butler University in Indianapolis and a Master of Science degree in nursing from Wayne State University in Detroit. She is frequently sought as a national speaker in the area of payment, clinical innovation, and population health.

In his role as president and chief executive officer of Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota and its parent company Stella, Dr. Craig E. Samitt is responsible for overseeing the strategy and operations of the state’s first and largest health plan.

Dr. Samitt came to Blue Cross in July 2018 from Anthem, Inc., where he served as executive vice president and president of their Diversified Business Group. He built partnerships within and outside of Anthem to provide new sources of growth for the enterprise and deepened Anthem’s relationships and impact across the healthcare ecosystem. Concurrently, he led and executed a nationwide clinical vision and strategy as Anthem’s chief clinical officer. Dr. Samitt’s numerous accomplishments at Anthem include advancing the company’s portfolio of provider partnerships and payment innovation models, leading quality improvements in patient outcomes and increasing the delivery of value-based care.

An internal medicine physician by training, Dr. Samitt has worked across multiple sectors within the health care industry. His career includes a number of senior executive positions, including partner and global provider practice leader at Oliver Wyman; president and CEO of HealthCare Partners, a subsidiary of DaVita HealthCare; and president and CEO of Dean Health System Inc., one of the largest integrated health systems in the Midwest.

For nearly 25 years, Dr. Samitt has been a nationally recognized expert and thought leader on health care delivery and policy. His record of collaborating across the health care system to deliver higher quality care at a lower cost led to him being named as one of the “50 Most Influential Physician Executives and Leaders” by Modern Healthcare in 2018.

Dr. Samitt currently serves on multiple boards, including the National Committee for Quality Assurance; the Blue Cross Blue Shield Association; the National Institute for Health Care Management Foundation; Prime Therapeutics; Minnesota Business Partnership; the Minnesota Council of Health Plans; and the Twin Cities Habitat for Humanity. Additionally, he is a former commissioner of the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission (MedPAC), an independent agency that advises Congress on Medicare payment policy.

Dr. Samitt holds an undergraduate degree from Tufts University, a medical degree from Columbia University and an MBA from the Wharton School of Business. He completed a medical residency in internal medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston and is a fellow of the American College of Physicians.

David A. Shore is a leading authority on innovation and managing change initiatives to gain competitive advantage.  Throughout his career he has worked to combine research, teaching, consulting and writing to build constructive links between theory and practice.

Shore has been on the faculty of Harvard University for more than two decades. He is also Distinguished Professor of Innovation and Change at Tianjin University of Finance and Economics (China) and Adjunct Professor of Organizational Development and Change at the School of Business, University of Monterrey (Mexico).  Shore is a faculty member of The Governance Institute and Executive-in-Residence at Enable East (United Kingdom).  He has held visiting professorships including in Amsterdam, Santiago, and Shanghai and consulted on six continents.  Shore offers executive education seminars and facilitates strategic planning and guided implementation retreats.  He has delivered hundreds of keynote addresses and workshops across multiple industries.

Previously, Shore spent two decades at the Harvard School of Public Health, where he served as associate dean.  He founded and directed the School's flagship programs:  Forces of Change; The Trust Initiative; and the Certificate Program on Launching and Leading Successful Change Initiatives.

He has served on and chaired numerous boards and committees, and currently is a founding member of McKinsey & Company's External Implementation Advisory Board which has a primary focus on operationalizing strategy for transformational change.   He also sits on the Board of Directors of the Marshfield Clinic Health System, as well as several editorial boards.  Among his honors is the Doctorate Fellow from the Academy of Multi-Skills (United Kingdom).  Along with innovation and change, Shore's body of work focuses on creating higher performing organizations including building and rebuilding trust; reimaging and reengineering meetings; and, strategic marketing and branding.

His most recent books include Launching and Leading Successful Change Initiatives in Health Care Organizations: (Jossey-Bass, 2014); Forces of Change:  New Strategies for the Evolving Health Care Marketplace (Jossey-Bass, 2012); and High Stakes:  The Critical Role of Stakeholders in Health Care, with E. Kupferberg (Oxford University Press, 2011).  He has also written a book on trust and edited a second.

Professor Shore has been recognized as a Top Thought Leader in Trust by Trust Across America – Trust Around the World.   He is also a multiple recipient of Harvard's Letter of Commendation for Distinguished Teaching Performance, including in 2017 and 2018; and was chosen to deliver a 2015 and 2016 Harvard Lecture That Lasts (Harvard's version of a TED Talk) and a TEDx Talk. 

Never known to simply :admire the problem," beyond intellectually stimulating, Shore provides executable advice, inspiring leaders and organizations to gain a unique and adaptable competitive advantage.

Eliza “Pippa” Shulman, DO, MPH is the Medical Director of the Center for Healthcare Innovation at Atrius Health, charged with identifying, testing and implementing novel care delivery solutions as part of the largest independent multi-specialty medical group in the Northeast. In addition she is the lead virtual hospitalist for Medically Home, Atrius Health’s hospital in the home program.

Prior to being named to the Innovation Center Pippa was the Chief of Geriatrics and Palliative Care at Harvard Vanguard Medical Associates; tasked with leading improvement efforts in home care, extended care facilities, outpatient geriatrics and palliative care services. As chief and as part of the ACO geriatric care model workgroup she led numerous initiatives to redesign care for frail elder patients, including implementation of an organization wide strategy for improving advance care planning.

Dr. Shulman is board certified in family medicine, preventive medicine, and hospice and palliative medicine. She is a graduate of the combined NH-Dartmouth Family Medicine Residency and the Dartmouth Hitchcock Leadership Preventive Medicine Residency, which is focused on developing physicians to lead change and improve systems of care.

Charles W. Sorenson, MD, FACS, is President and CEO Emeritus of Intermountain Healthcare and the Founding Director of the Intermountain Healthcare Leadership Institute, a position he assumed in late 2016. The Institute’s premier program is designed for selected high potential health system leaders from the US and abroad. Staffed by a faculty of content experts from Intermountain and other distinguished health systems and academic institutions, the Institute’s focus is on the development of trusted leaders at the intersection of clinical and operational expertise.

Dr. Sorenson served as President and CEO of Intermountain Healthcare from January 2009 until his retirement from this position in October 2016. Prior to that, he served for eleven years as Intermountain’s Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer.

Dr. Sorenson, a graduate of the University of Utah and Weill Cornell Medical College at Cornell University (MD), is a board-certified Urologic Surgeon and a Fellow of the American College of Surgeons. He is an Adjunct Professor of Surgery at the University of Utah.

Dr. Sorenson has a long-standing interest in clinical process improvement and in the development of Intermountain’s integrated delivery system. Under Dr. Sorenson’s leadership as Chief Operating Officer and as Chief Executive Officer, Intermountain Healthcare implemented a disciplined and system-wide focus on best clinical and operational practices aimed at producing measurably better outcomes for patients at costs that are sustainable to the communities Intermountain serves.

In addition to his administrative responsibilities, Dr. Sorenson has continued to be involved in the practice of urologic surgery at the Intermountain Medical Center, with a primary focus on urologic oncology. He also serves on several not-for-profit boards, including the Providence St. Joseph Health System Board.

Rebecca A. Stametz is the Associate Vice President, Product Innovation in the Steele Institute for Health Innovation at Geisinger. Rebecca is a healthcare innovator and radical collaborator focused on a commitment to building a people-centered culture and fostering the creative confidence of individuals. Her work philosophy couples an emphasis on collaborative engagement and strategic development and deployment of end to end health information technologies and analytics in community, clinical and home settings. As a principal, her research focuses on program implementation science, medical transparency, family-patient engagement, and learning healthcare system models. Rebecca holds a Masters of Public Health from East Stroudsburg University and a Doctorate of Education in Adult Education from Pennsylvania State University.

Dr. Swensen, dedicated to the support of thoughtful leaders who aspire to nurture fulfillment of their staff, is a recognized expert and speaker in the disciplines of leadership and burnout. His work and research show that it is possible to cultivate camaraderie, agency and coherence for high value results.

For three decades he served patients at the Mayo Clinic. As Director for Leadership and Organization Development, he co-led the Professional Burnout Initiative and oversaw the development of 4,100 physicians and 232 key leaders. As Chief Quality Officer, he established the Quality Academy wherein 37,000 colleagues were certified as Fellows during his tenure. As Department Chair, he and his team used their Value Creation System to improve the welfare of both patients and professionals. Dr. Swensen serves as Senior Fellow of the Institute for Healthcare Improvement, where his focus is joy in work. He works as the Leadership Theme Leader for NEJM Catalyst.

A full professor, he was Principal Investigator of two National Institutes of Health grants and has authored two books and 207 articles. He was honored with the Diamond Lifetime Achievement Award, served as the president of two international societies and founded the Big Sky Group. He holds a Masters of Medical Management from Carnegie Mellon University’s Heinz College of Information Systems and Public Policy.

Swensen has been married for 42 years, has two children and has run or cross-country skied 39 marathons.

Michael Thompson is the President and CEO of the National Alliance of Healthcare Purchaser Coalitions (National Alliance), an association of approximately 50 regional coalitions collectively supporting over 12,000 healthcare purchasers providing health coverage to more than 45 million Americans. The National Alliance helps to lead improvements in health, wellbeing and value for our companies and communities across the country.

Prior to joining the National Alliance, Mike was a Principal at PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) for 20 years. Thompson is a nationally recognized thought leader for business health strategies and health system reform. He has worked with major employers and other stakeholders on sustainable cost reduction, integrated health, wellness and consumerism, retiree health, private health exchanges and health reform. Known for developing and promoting collaborative cross-sector health industry initiatives, Mike participated on the steering board of the World Economic Forum’s “Working towards Wellness” initiative and co-founded the Private Exchange Evaluation Collaborative (PEEC). Prior to PwC, Mike served as an executive with diverse roles with Prudential Healthcare for over 17 years.

Mike is a Fellow of the Society of Actuaries, serving on the Health Practice Council, and chairs the Medicare Sub-Committee of the American Academy of Actuaries (AAA). He is also widely recognized as a leading national advocate for mental health and wellbeing and was Past President of the New York City chapter of the National Alliance for Mental Illness (NAMI). Mike previously was an active member of the board of the Northeast Business Group on Health for 11 years.

Lori Tishler, MD MPH has always been passionate about the care of vulnerable populations and making health care work better for people. She is Vice President of Medical Affairs at Commonwealth Care Alliance; responsible for the oversight and management of medical policy, physician staff, behavioral health integration, clinical network provider engagement and clinical quality initiatives. In her role, Lori partners closely with CCA’s executive leadership to spearhead and further clinical redesign efforts, ensure quality care delivery and care management, respond to the concerns and needs of medical staff members, implement medical policy and help to drive clinical growth and transformation.

Lori comes to CCA from Brigham and Women's Hospital where she was an active primary care physician and Medical Director for the Phyllis Jen Center for Primary Care. She managed over 100 physicians and led the medical home transformation.

Lori graduated from Harvard Medical School and completed a residency in Internal Medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital. She graduated from Harvard and Radcliffe Colleges with an AB in History and Science and from Harvard School of Public Health with a Masters in Public Health. She loves to spend time with her husband and teenage daughter and to travel.

David K. Vawdrey, Ph.D. is Chief Data Informatics Officer at Geisinger. He is responsible for implementing transformational technologies and leveraging Geisinger’s advanced data and informatics infrastructure to create value for patients, clinicians, researchers, and members across 13 hospital campuses, 250 clinics, a health plan with nearly 600,000 members, and the Geisinger Commonwealth School of Medicine.

Dr. Vawdrey was the founding director of NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital’s Value Institute, where he developed and evaluated innovative clinical information systems interventions that have benefited clinicians and patients across the country. An Associate Professor at Columbia University’s Department of Biomedical Informatics, Dr. Vawdrey has been a passionate teacher and adviser for informatics graduate students since 2007.

Dr. Vawdrey is a national speaker on using data analytics and informatics to transform healthcare, and he is an elected Fellow of the American College of Medical Informatics. His research in areas such as clinical decision support, quality & safety, and patient engagement has resulted in over 100 peer-reviewed publications.

Dr. Vawdrey is a graduate of Brigham Young University, where he earned a bachelor’s degree in computer engineering and a master’s in computer science. He completed his Ph.D. in biomedical informatics at the University of Utah.

Jennifer Willis joined Pathways, Inc. in November of 1999. She has spent the majority of her career serving consumers in a Community Mental Health setting. Jennifer has served as Psychiatric Nurse/Outpatient Therapist, Greenup County Coordinator, and Director of Nursing and Medical Services for Pathway Inc. during her tenure. Currently, Jennifer serves as the Chief Clinical Officer for Pathways Inc. She provides leadership and guidance to clinical and medical staff in Mental Health, Addiction, Crisis, Intellectual & Developmental Disabilities Services (IDDS), and the Prevention programs. Jennifer leads the implementation of new programs and efficiencies for the agency. Jennifer earned her degree as a Registered Nurse from St. Mary’s Hospital School of Nursing in Huntington, WV. She is Board Certified in Psychiatric and Mental Health Nursing. Jennifer has specialized training in Trauma-Focused Cognitive Behavioral Therapy and is listed in Who’s Who among American Registered Nurses.

Jean oversees the strategic direction and business operations for Tufts Health Public Plans, Tufts Health Plan's managed Medicaid and state-sponsored plans division, which operates in Massachusetts and Rhode Island.

With more than 15 years in health care, including provider, insurer and Exchange marketplace experience, Jean’s background gives her deep knowledge of the health insurance industry and its complexities. Prior to joining Tufts Health Plan, Jean served as the executive director of the Children’s Hospital Integrated Care Organization, a group representing Children’s Hospital Boston and its affiliated physicians. She is also a past executive director of the Commonwealth Health Insurance Connector Authority, after initially serving as its chief financial officer. Jean began her work in health insurance at Tufts Health Plan in 2004, where she served on the contracting, strategy and analytics team.

Jean has served on the boards of the Health Policy Commission and Group Insurance Commission. She earned a B.S. in biochemistry from Peking University in Beijing, China and an M.B.A. from Harvard Business School.

Angela Yochem is EVP & Chief Digital Officer for Novant Health, a super-regional healthcare system with one of the largest medical groups in the US. She and her teams deliver the world-class consumer capabilities, differentiating technologies, and advanced clinical solutions that allow the high-growth system to provide remarkable patient care.

Angela has served as EVP/CIO at Rent-A-Center, Global CIO at BDP International, Global CTO at AstraZeneca, and divisional CIO at Dell. She’s held tech exec roles at Bank of America and SunTrust, and held senior technology roles at UPS and IBM. In these roles, she built B2B digital product lines, grew digital retail channels (B2C), created technical services lines of business, and transformed global technology capabilities.

Angela has been a Director for the Federal Home Loan Bank of Pittsburgh, BDP Transport, BDP Global Services Asia and Europe, and Rocana, in the Audit, Enterprise Risk, Operational Risk, and Governance/Policy committees. She remains an EIR for Vonzos Partners, a Mentor for SKTA Innopartners, and an Advisor for Dioko Ventures. Angela proudly serves on the board of Freedom School Partners, a non-profit committed to promoting literacy in the Charlotte area, and on the executive team of the Go Red for Women organization, part of the American Heart Association. She is a Trustee of the Charlotte Regional Business Initiative, and is an advisory board member for the American Hospital Association and the University of Tennessee Electrical Engineering and Computer Science department.

Angela has a Bachelor of Music from DePauw University and a Master of Science in Computer Science from the University of Tennessee, holds three US Patents and is an author with Addison-Wesley and Prentice-Hall.

DuAne has nearly 20 years of experience in field of behavioral and public health. He is currently the Deputy Administrator over Medical Programs and Community Based Services for the Nevada Division of Health Care Financing and Policy commonly known as Nevada Medicaid. He was worked in the public sector in both Indiana and Nevada in both State Court Administration and the Department of Health and Human Services. His work in the private sector included overseeing the project development and implementation strategy for the 2013 publication of the American Society of Addition Medicine (ASAM) Criteria. DuAne received his Bachelor’s in Science in Family Studies from Miami University and a Master’s in Management from Indiana Wesleyan University. He is also ABD degree status in the Organizational Leadership Doctoral Program at Indiana Wesleyan University. All his post graduate work has focused on leadership practices within varying healthcare settings. He has been published in multiple journals for his work in intersecting the role of behavioral change within healthcare.

Sherri Zink is senior vice president and chief data and engagement officer for BlueCross BlueShield of Tennessee, which has 6,000 employees and serves more than 3.5 million members in the state and across the country.

She oversees enterprise information assets and leads the data and analytics center of excellence. As the chief data and engagement officer, Zink owns the corporate-wide analytics strategy and promotes data as a cross-corporate asset by turning information into action that results in healthier, more informed members.

While leading the Information Delivery division at BlueCross, Zink’s team earned numerous awards for its use of data to improve efficiency and quality, including:

• 2019 CIO 100 Award
• 2018 CIO 100 Award
• 2017 Digital Edge 50 Award
• 2016 ComputerWorld Top 100 Technology Leaders Award
• CIO Magazine’s 2016 Top 100 Most Innovative Use of Analytics Award

Prior to joining BCBST, Zink served as vice president of data and analytics for Optum and as director of reporting strategies for CIGNA. She has more than 30 years of experience in the health care industry serving in multiple roles at three major health care insurers. Her experience is primarily focused on clinical and financial data integration, clinical value-based reporting, customer consultation and account management.

She graduated from Covenant College with a Bachelor of Science with an emphasis in organizational management. Zink also holds an Associate of Science degree with an emphasis in information systems technology from Chattanooga State Technical Community College.