Partners HealthCare
Center of Expertise in Health Policy and Management
Faculty Bios
COE Co-Chairs
Arnold Epstein, MD
John H. Foster Professor and Chair of the Department of Health Policy and Management at Harvard University School of Public Health
Dr. Epstein is the John H. Foster Professor and Chair of the Department of Health Policy and Management at Harvard University School of Public Health. He is a practicing internist in the Department of Medicine (Division of General Medicine) at the Brigham and Women's Hospital. His research interests focus on quality of care and access to care for disadvantaged populations. He was vice chair of the Institute of Medicine Committee on Developing a National Report on Health Care Quality. He also served as chairman of the board of AcademyHealth. He was Co-chair of the Performance Measurement Coordinating Council of the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations, the National Committee on Quality Assurance, and the American Medical Association. He worked in the White House for two years during the first term of the Clinton administration, and he currently serves on the Board of Governors of the Patient Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI) established by the Affordable Care Act. He has served on several editorial boards including the Journal of Health Services Research, the American Journal of Medicine, and the Annals of Internal Medicine and he has been elected to the Society for Clinical Investigation and the Association of American Physicians. He is Associate Editor of the New England Journal of Medicine and a member of the Institute of Medicine. He received a BA from the University of Rochester, a master’s degree in political science from Harvard University, a BMS from Dartmouth Medical School and a MD from Duke University.
Timothy G. Ferris, MD, MPH
Medical Director, Mass General Physicians Organization and PHS Vice President for Population Health Management
Dr. Ferris is a practicing general internist and pediatrician and the medical director of the Mass General Physicians Organization. He is formally the Vice Chair for Quality for Partners Pediatrics and Mass General Hospital for Children. He is also a Senior Scientist in the Partners/MGH Institute for Health Policy and an Associate Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School. His research has focused on the measurement and improvement of health care quality for adults and children, particularly focused on the roles of financing and health information technology. In addition to quality improvement interventions he has published studies on the effects of the organization and financing of care on the costs and quality of care, risk adjustment of quality measures, and disparities in health care. He has over 50 publications including those in journals such as the New England Journal of Medicine, JAMA, Pediatrics, and Health Affairs. Dr. Ferris has been leading efforts at Partners Healthcare to improve the care of patients with multiple chronic conditions with specific responsibility for design, oversight and evaluation of programs to improve quality and efficiency of care for high‐risk patients such as those with heart failure.
Health Policy Center of Expertise Faculty
Clay Ackerly, MD, MSc
PHS Associate Medical Director for Population Health and Continuing Care and MGH Assistant Chief Medical Officer for Non-Acute Services
Dr. D. Clay Ackerly II, MD, MSc, is a primary care physician with a special interest in the needs of older adults. In addition to his clinical duties, he serves as Associate Medical Director for Population Health and Continuing Care at Partners Healthcare, and as Assistant Chief Medical Officer for Non-Acute Services at the Massachusetts General Hospital. In these roles, he is responsible for multiple efforts to improve the quality and efficiency of post-acute care.
Dr. Ackerly recently served as an Innovation Advisor to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) and was named a Practice Change Leader by the John A. Hartford Foundation and the Atlantic Philanthropies. Prior to pursuing his medical training, Dr. Ackerly served in the private sector and the Federal Government, including at CMS and the White House, where he advanced multiple healthcare quality improvement efforts. He was Founder and Editor-in-Chief of the Harvard Health Policy Review, and he has since published articles in journals such as the Lancet, Health Affairs and Academic Medicine.
Born and raised in Washington, DC, Dr. Ackerly graduated from Harvard College with a degree in Health Policy (magna cum laude); earned his medical degree as a Nanaline Duke Scholar at the Duke University School of Medicine; and completed his Internal Medicine training at the Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH). In addition, he holds a Masters degree in International Health Policy from the London School of Economics.
Dale S. Adler, MD
Executive Vice Chair, Department of Medicine, Brigham & Women's Hospital
Dr. Adler is responsible for department and hospital network development and strategy, for physician management of Brigham Medical specialties, for BWH DOM relationship with other health care centers. His main responsibilities include identifying new outreach opportunities for specialists and primary care physicians in coordination with BWH and BWPO network strategy. He received his BA from Harvard University, his MD from Cornell University and trained at BWH in Internal Medicine and Cardiology. In 2006 he joined BWH from Case Western Reserve University, where he was chief of Cardiology for eight years, professor of Medicine, director of the Cardiovascular Service Line, and vice chair for Clinical Affairs in the Department of Medicine. In addition, during his time at Case Western Reserve University, he helped integrate 10 satellite hospitals to increase the scope of services.
Stanley W. Ashley, MD
Chief Medical Officer and Senior Vice President for Medical Affairs, Brigham and Women’s Hospital
Stanley W. Ashley, MD is Chief Medical Officer and Senior Vice President for Medical Affairs at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Frank Sawyer Professor of Surgery at Harvard Medical School. A graduate of Oberlin College and Cornell University Medical College, he completed a residency in general surgery and joined the faculty at Washington University in St. Louis. He subsequently spent 7 years at UCLA before assuming his current position at Brigham and Women’s Hospital/ Harvard Medical School in 1997. He previously served as Vice Chairman of the Department of Surgery and Program Director of the General Surgery Residency. Dr. Ashley is a gastrointestinal surgeon whose primary interests are diseases of the pancreas and inflammatory bowel disease. His research, which has been funded by both the VA the NIH, has examined the pathophysiology of the small bowel and pancreas. The author of more than 250 publications, he serves on numerous editorial boards, including the Journal of Gastrointestinal Surgery, the Journal of the American College of Surgeons, Current Problems in Surgery, and ACS Surgery. He is currently Chair of the American Board of Surgery and Secretary-Elect of the Society for Surgery of the Alimentary Tract.
Joseph R. Betancourt, MD, MPH
Director, The Disparities Solutions Center; Senior Scientist, The Institute for Health Policy; Director of Multicultural Education, Mass General Hospital and Assistant Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School
Dr. Betancourt is an Associate Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School, and directs the Disparities Solutions Center at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH), which works with healthcare organizations to improve quality of care, address racial and ethnic disparities, and achieve equity. He is also Director of Multicultural Education at MGH, and an expert in cross-cultural care and communication. He practices Internal Medicine at the MGH Internal Medicine Associates. Dr. Betancourt is a co-founder of Quality Interactions, Inc., a company that has created and deployed a portfolio of e-learning programs in the area of cross-cultural care and communication to over 125,000 health care professionals across the country.
Dr. Betancourt has served on several Institute of Medicine (IOM) Committees, including those that produced “Unequal Treatment: Confronting Racial/Ethnic Disparities in Health Care”, “Guidance for a National Health Care Disparities Report”, and “In the Nation’s Compelling Interest: Ensuring Diversity in the Health Care Workforce.” and served on the IOM Roundtable on Health Literacy. He was a member of the Massachusetts State Committee on Racial/Ethnic Disparities and served on the Boston Public Health Commission’s Committee on Racial/Ethnic Disparities. Dr. Betancourt co-chairs the MGH Committee on Racial and Ethnic Disparities and the Harvard Medical School Cross-Cultural Care Committee, and sits on the Boston Board of Health as well as Health Equity Committee, and the Massachusetts Disparities Council. Dr. Betancourt is on the Boards of Trinity Health, a large, national Catholic healthcare system based in Michigan, as well as Neighborhood Health Plan, a Medicaid Managed Care Plan based in Boston.
O’Neil Britton, MD
Chief Health Information Officer, Partners HealthCare, and Executive Director, Partners eCare
O’Neil Britton provides clinical and academic leadership in the development and implementation of Partners eCare. He works closely with clinical, academic, IT, and administrative leaders to ensure Partners eCare serves all of the Partners’ missions. Previously, Britton served as Chief Medical Officer of Brigham and Women’s Faulkner Hospital (BWFH), where he was responsible for shared oversight of the quality and safety of patient care and access, physician professionalism and peer support, network integration and development, and the creation and implementation of key clinical strategic initiatives. In addition to his role as CMO, he was also responsible for the administrative oversight of the BWFH Emergency Department that provides care to more than 25,000 patients per year, and the Information Systems Department that is responsible for the management and improvement of the MEDITECH Electronic Health Record.
Britton remains clinically active at both BWFH and BWH as a hospitalist. He is recognized both locally and nationally as a thought leader dedicated to the professional development of students, trainees, and junior faculty and the importance of mentoring on career advancement opportunities throughout the medical profession.
Craig Bunnell, MD, MBA, MPH
Associate Chief Medical Officer, Dana Farber Cancer Institute
Dr. Bunnell is the Associate Chief Medical Officer of the Dana‐Farber Cancer Institute. He received his MD from Harvard Medical School and his MPH from Harvard School of Public Health in 1990. He received his MBA from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 2008. He completed his residency in internal medicine and a fellowship in hematology and oncology at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital, where he also served as chief medical resident. He joined the DFCI faculty in 1996, and is a member of the Breast Oncology Center in the Gillette Women’s Cancers Program.
Jonathan Coblyn, MD
Director of Clinical Rheumatology, Brigham and Women’s Hospital
Dr. Jonathan Coblyn is Director of Clinical Rheumatology at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Director of the Center for Arthritis and Joint Diseases. He is the former director of primary care at BWH and has managed network Integration of inpatient activities to improve efficiencies.
Dennis D. Colling
Vice President, Human Resources, Partners HealthCare
Dennis Colling has been Vice President for Human Resources of Partners Healthcare since 1994. He is responsible for oversight of all Human Resources activities across the Partners network. Human Resources is structured such that the HR leader at each entity enjoys a dual reporting relationship to both entity leadership and to him. This framework ensures that Human Resources is positioned to align services to the strategic mission of both Partners and the entity and is able to balances system needs with those of the academic, community, and specialty hospitals and the physician networks.
Dennis previously held similar positions at the University of Pennsylvania Health System (UPHS), where he was awarded the “Healthcare Heroes Award” by the Philadelphia Business Journal as Benefits Manager for the Year; and at the Catherine McAuley Health System, Ann Arbor, Michigan, a large regional health system that included an owned health maintenance organization. During his tenure there, the system was listed as one of Working Mothers' “75 Best Companies for Working Mothers”. Dennis also worked for the Veterans Administration in Detroit, and served in the U.S. Navy from 1970 - 1974. Dennis received an A.B. in political science and a Masters of Business Administration from the University of Michigan.
Jessica C. Dudley, MD
Chief Medical Officer, Brigham and Women’s Physician’s Organization
As Chief Medical Officer for the Brigham and Women’s Physician’s Organization, Dr. Dudley is responsible for overseeing the contracting efforts on behalf of the BWPO and leading the medical management team in developing and implementing programs designed to meet pay for performance targets related to efficiency and quality. Additional responsibilities include addressing physician work‐life issues and collaboration and development of physician leadership and volunteerism programs. Previously, as Associate Medical Director for Partners Community HealthCare, Inc. (PCHI), and Team Leader for the High Performance Medicine Trend Management Team, Dr. Dudley was responsible for developing and coordinating system wide approaches to address areas of increasing resource utilization. Previously, Dr. Dudley was Medical Director for Partners Human Resources. Prior to this position, Dr. Dudley had worked as Associate Medical Director and Assistant Medical Director, for PCHI. Dr. Dudley received her medical degree from Harvard Medical School. She completed her internship and residency in Primary Care Internal Medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, MA and is Board Certified in Internal Medicine.
Sunil Eappen, MD
Chairman of the Department of Anesthesiology and Chief Medical Director of the Operating Room, Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary
Dr. Eappen is Chairman of the Department of Anesthesiology and the Chief Medical Officer at the Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary in Boston, Massachusetts. The Mass. Eye and Ear has 21 operating rooms and performs approximately 20, 000 operative procedures yearly including nearly 5000 pediatric procedures. Prior to this position, He worked at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital as an obstetrical anesthesiologist and was the Vice Chairman for Clinical Affairs and the Clinical Director. Dr. Eappen started his career spending three years in a basic science laboratory investigating the contribution of the spinal cord to mechanisms of action of general anesthetics and the interaction of various anesthetic agents. Recent research interests involve quality and operational efficiency in the utilization of operating room resources as well as the financial implications of surgical complications.
Matthew E. Fishman
Vice President, Community Health, Partners HealthCare
Matt Fishman is Vice President for Community Health at Partners HealthCare. Matt leads Partners' efforts to collaborate with community health centers and other community-focused organizations to make measurable progress on public health and economic opportunity. In addition, Matt focuses on improving systems of care for low income patients and their caregivers, and providing affordable coverage through implementation of the landmark Massachusetts health care reform law, which he worked with many other people to help design.