Catalyst

Kristy Duffey, board certified geriatric nurse practitioner, leads Optum’s HouseCalls and Complex Care Management clinical teams including Optum At Home, ISNP and Post Acute Care, as the Chief Nursing Officer. An accomplished clinician with a focus on the geriatric population, Kristy has over 20 years of experience at UnitedHealth Group and is a distinguished clinical leader within the enterprise. Currently she oversees more than 5,000 clinicians including 3,500 advanced practice clinicians within Optum.

Under her leadership, the Optum HouseCalls program has completed over 10M in home visits since its inception in 2012 including 1.7M visits in 2020. Recently the team has launched Optum At Home, an innovative, longitudinal in-home care program targeting Dual Special Needs Plan members in 6 states. The Institutional Special Needs Plan delivers care in skilled nursing facilities for 60k members across 33 states and recently achieved a 5 Star Rating from Center of Medicare and Medicaid (CMS) for 2020. The COVID pandemic was an incredible challenge and Kristy’s team provided urgent solutions during time of ambiguity under her unwavering leadership. Kristy spent time as CEO of Optum Population Health Solutions and her leadership was instrumental in growing the business, developing talent, and transforming products to better serve members.

Kristy’s contributions to Optum include the generation of a comprehensive assessment focused on identifying health care gaps and coordination of care, unique alternatives for care delivery settings and the promotion of patient-centric care models across Optum. Kristy currently sits on the board for the UnitedHealth Group foundation and has been selected as the UHG clinical representative in discussions with the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission (MedPAC), the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), as well as the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) on issues relating to health care and Medicare offerings.

Kristy’s passion for the nursing profession and efforts to overcome barriers to full-practice authority are evident in her partnership with UnitedHealth Group’s Center for Clinician Advancement. Kristy’s respectable contribution to the nursing industry was recognized in September, 2016 with her induction as a fellow in the American Academy of Nursing (AAN). This prestigious credential (FAAN) is an acknowledgment that Kristy’s nursing career has significantly influenced health care policies and the health and well-being of all. She is living her mission of promoting holistic and patient-centered care and in doing so, is transforming the health care delivery system. Kristy received her BSN from University of South Carolina, her MS from the University of Maryland, School of Nursing. She is a mother of two and currently lives in Arizona with her husband.

A practicing physician, Ashish K. Jha, MD, MPH, is recognized globally as an expert on pandemic preparedness and response as well as on health policy research and practice. He has led groundbreaking research around Ebola and is now on the front lines of the Covid-19 response, leading national and international analysis of key issues and advising state and federal policy makers.

Dr. Jha has published more than two hundred original research publications in prestigious journals such as the New England Journal of Medicine and the BMJ, and is a frequent contributor to a range of public media. He has extensively researched how to improve the quality and reduce the cost of health care, focusing on the impact of public health policy nationally and around the globe.

On September 1, 2020, Dr. Jha started his role as the Dean of the School of Public Health at Brown University. Before that, Dr. Jha was a faculty member at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health since 2004 and Harvard Medical School since 2005. He was the Faculty Director of the Harvard Global Health Institute from 2014 until September 2020. From 2018 to 2020, he served as the Dean for Global Strategy at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. A general internist previously with the West Roxbury VA in Massachusetts, Dr. Jha will continue his practice at the Providence VA Medical Center.

Dr. Jha was born in Pursaulia, Bihar, India in 1970. He moved to Toronto, Canada in 1979 and then to the United States in 1983. In 1992, Dr. Jha graduated magna cum laude from Columbia University with a BA in economics. He received his MD from Harvard Medical School in 1997 and then trained as a resident in Internal Medicine at the University of California, San Francisco. He returned to Boston to complete his fellowship in General Medicine from Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School. In 2004, he completed his Master of Public health degree at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. He was elected to the National Academy of Medicine in 2013.

Dr. Thomas Lee is Chief Medical Officer of Press Ganey, and an internist and cardiologist who practices at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston. He is a Professor of Medicine, part time, at Harvard Medical School and Professor of Health Policy and Management at the Harvard School of Public Health. Prior to joining Press Ganey, he served as Network President for Partners Healthcare System and Chief Executive Officer for Partners Community HealthCare, Inc., the integrated delivery system founded by Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Massachusetts General Hospital.

He is a member of the Board of Directors of Geisinger Health System, Chairman of the Board of Directors for the Geisinger Health Plan, Geisinger Quality Options, Inc., and Geisinger Indemnity Insurance Company Board of Directors. He is also a member of the Board of Directors of Health Leads; the Board of Overseers of Weill Cornell Medical College; the Special Medical Advisory Group (SMAG) of the Veterans Administration; and the Panel of Health Advisors of the Congressional Budget Office. He is a member of the Editorial Board of the New England Journal of Medicine, as well as Editor-in-Chief of NEJM Catalyst Innovations in Care Delivery and Co-Chair of the NEJM Catalyst Editorial Board.

He is the author of more than 260 academic articles and three books, Chaos and Organization in Health Care, Eugene Braunwald and the Rise of Modern Medicine, and An Epidemic of Empathy in HealthcarNamed in his honor, the Thomas H. Lee Award for Excellence in Primary Care is given each year to recognize a primary care physician at Brigham and Women’s Hospital who meets the needs of his or her patients exceptionally well.

Tom holds a bachelor’s degree in History and Science from Harvard College, a medical degree from Cornell University Medical College, and a master’s degree in Epidemiology from the Harvard School of Public Health. He lives in Milton, Massachusetts, with his wife, Dr. Soheyla Gharib, who is Chief of Medicine at Harvard University Health Services. The couple has three daughters.

Michael McWilliams, MD, PhD is the Warren Alpert Foundation Professor of Health Care Policy and a Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School. He is also a general internist at Brigham and Women’s Hospital. Dr. McWilliams’s research spans questions related to health care spending, quality, and access, with an overarching goal of informing policies that support efficiency and equity in health care. His work has focused on 4 areas: 1) the design and effects of payment systems, 2) the organization and quality of health care delivery, 3) effects of health insurance coverage, and 4) quasi-experimental methods for causal inference in observational research. He is currently principal investigator of a Program Project (P01) on the Medicare program funded by the National Institute on Aging and an R01 grant from the National Cancer Institute on Medicaid expansions in the South. In other research supported by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality and Arnold Ventures, he is examining the effects of provider consolidation, accuracy of performance data, design of population-based payment models, methods for improving risk adjustment, and strategies for leveraging professionalism more productively in health care.

Dr. McWilliams’s research has earned several honors, including the AcademyHealth HSR Impact Award and distinctions for specific papers from AcademyHealth, the Society of General Internal Medicine, the National Institute for Health Care Management Foundation, and Health Affairs. He received the Alice S. Hersh New Investigator Award from AcademyHealth, the Outstanding Junior Investigator of the Year Award from the Society of General Internal Medicine, a Paul B. Beeson Career Development Award in Aging Research, and a Clinical Scientist Development Award from the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation. He is an elected member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation and currently serves as a member of the FAIR Health Academic Advisory Board and the board of directors for the Institute for Accountable Care. He is an Associate Editor for JAMA Internal Medicine.

Dr. McWilliams received his BS with highest distinction in biology as a Morehead Scholar from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, his MD magna cum laude from Harvard Medical School, and his PhD in Health Policy from Harvard University. He completed his residency in general internal medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital.

Mark A. Schuster, MD, PhD, became the Founding Dean and CEO of the new Kaiser Permanente Bernard J. Tyson School of Medicine in October 2017. Prior to that, he had served as the William Berenberg Professor of Pediatrics at Harvard Medical School and Chief of General Pediatrics and Vice Chair for Health Policy in the Department of Medicine at Boston Children’s Hospital since 2007.

Dr. Schuster is internationally recognized as a leader in research on child, adolescent, and family health. With funding from NIH, CDC, and AHRQ, he has studied topics such as quality of care, health disparities, family leave, sexual and gender minority health, obesity prevention, and adolescent sexual health. Before moving to Boston, he served as Professor of Pediatrics and of Health Services at UCLA Schools of Medicine and Public Health and Director of Health Promotion and Disease Prevention at RAND, the Santa Monica think tank.

Dr. Schuster has coauthored over 250 articles and two books. He is an elected member of the National Academy of Medicine and has served as President of the Academic Pediatric Association. He is a recipient of the Richardson Award for lifetime achievement from the Society for Pediatric Research, the Barger Excellence in Mentoring Award from Harvard Medical School, and the Joseph St. Geme, Jr. Leadership Award from the Federation of Pediatric Organizations. Dr. Schuster has been named among Modern Healthcare’s 100 Most Influential People in Healthcare and Modern Healthcare’s 50 Most Influential Clinical Executives. He received his BA summa cum laude from Yale, his MD from Harvard Medical School, his MPP from the Harvard Kennedy School of Government, and his PhD from the Pardee RAND Graduate School. He completed his pediatric residency at Boston Children’s Hospital and his fellowship at the UCLA Robert Wood Johnson Clinical Scholars Program.

Amy W. Williams, MD Executive Dean of Practice, Consultant, Nephrology and Hypertension, Professor of Medicine, Chair, Department of Medicine, Mayo Clinic Amy Williams, MD, is the Mayo Clinic Executive Dean of Practice, Professor of Medicine in the Mayo Clinic College of Medicine and Science, and faculty member in the Division of Hypertension and Nephrology at Mayo Clinic in Rochester. In 2019, she was elected to serve on the Mayo Clinic Board of Governors and Mayo Clinic Board of Trustees.

Dr. Williams is a graduate of Goucher College (Baltimore, Maryland) and received her medical degree at Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine (Cleveland, Ohio). She completed her internal medicine residency and nephrology fellowship at Mayo Clinic. Since joining Mayo Clinic in 1990, Dr. Williams has held numerous leadership positions while managing significant inpatient and outpatient clinical responsibilities. She was the first woman Chair of the Department of Medicine, is a member of the Executive Operations Team, the President’s Cabinet, and is Chair of the Mayo Clinic Clinical Practice Committee.

Previously, Dr. Williams served as Medical Director of Hospital Operations for Mayo Clinic Hospital – Rochester and Chair of the Hospital Practice Subcommittee. While serving in these roles, she led multiple successful, innovative practice initiatives, including the redesign of admissions and census management that decreased unnecessary transfers and length of stay, improved team effectiveness, and reduced readmissions. This led to systemwide diffusion of improvements across Mayo Clinic hospital, community practices in the Midwest, and nationally. Additionally, she was President of the Staff, Mayo Clinic Officers and Councilors.

She received the Doctor’s Mayo Society Lifetime Achievement Award in 2018 for her contributions to improving the care of patients, enhancing the practice, and championing the career development of all physician staff. Externally, Dr. Williams served on the Board of Directors of the American Board of Internal Medicine. She also participated in an Association of Professors of Medicine’s initiative to address sexual harassment in medicine. She has served as President of Women in Nephrology for two terms and on numerous task forces and boards for the American Society of Nephrology.

Clinicians in 2030

December 09, 2021

Virtual Event

Overview

Agenda

Presenters

Kristy Duffey, MS, APRN - BC, FAAN

Navina Evans, MBBS, DCH, MRCPsych

Ashish K. Jha, MD, MPH

Thomas H. Lee, MD, MSc

J. Michael McWilliams, MD, PhD

Edward Prewitt, MPP

Mark A. Schuster, MD, PhD

Amy W. Williams, MD

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