2017 Speaking Faculty

Dr. Jan Berger’s is the founder and CEO of Health Intelligence Partners. Jan's passion is to use communications to engage, educate and empower patients in their health. She is considered a national expert in quality innovation, medication adherence, HEDIS improvement, clinical Star measures and consumer health engagement.

With more than 25 years of business and clinical expertise, as well as broad international healthcare experience, Jan is regarded as one of the top thought leaders in healthcare. She is the author of more than 100 peer-reviewed journal articles, a frequent speaker on the national stage, and is often quoted in the national press.

As an active participant on numerous national quality and medication safety committees, Jan has served organizations including the National Committee on Quality Assurance, the National Quality Forum, the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Medical Association and many others. She is editor in chief of the American Journal of Pharmacy Benefits.

Prior to beginning Health Intelligence Partners, Jan was Jan was Senior Vice President and Chief Clinical Officer of CVS Caremark. During that time, along with her other responsibilities, Jan began and oversaw the medication adherence programs at CVS Caremark. Jan earned her medical degree and a Master’s degree in health law from Loyola University. She holds a Six Sigma Black Belt from the American Society of Quality and a certificate in business from the University of South Florida.

Dr. Burke was appointed Chief Patient Experience Officer for the Geisinger Health System in early 2014 and focuses his efforts on the delivery of compassionate and quality medical care throughout the entire system. He has practiced internal medicine at Geisinger Medical Center since 1992. He continues his role as medical director at both Geisinger HealthSouth Rehabilitation Hospital. He has a special interest in the promotion of professionalism in medical practice with an emphasis on applying a holistic philosophy of medicine.

He actively lectures and publishes articles in the fields of medical ethics and physician spirituality. He serves as the current editor-in-chief of "G"-the Geisinger Magazine. His awards in include the Clinical Excellence Award for HealthSouth (2009), Best Doctors in America (2007-08,2011-12), Victor Marks Service Excellence Award (2007,2013) and the Papal Medal "Benemerenti" award in 2007. He is a graduate of Jefferson Medical College and completed an internal medicine residency and chief residency at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital.

At Pfizer, Bryan is an experienced expert of content-based technology solutions supporting multiple channels, including social media, newspapers, magazines, textbooks, web and mobile. In this role, he is accountable for the review and approval tools for pharma promotional operations in North America and collaborates with brands to evolve global asset management by translating business needs, processes, applications, and system needs into usable technology.

Prior to joining Pfizer, Bryan was in digital marketing and media with GSK and was a Director of Publishing Technology for McGraw-Hill Education. Bryan has also served as a digital asset expert for The Wall Street Journal and is an Adobe Certified Expert (ACE) and Instructor (ACI).

David Davidovic has been involved in the commercialization of products and in building best-in-class commercial capabilities in the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industries for over 36 years. Most recently, David was Vice President and Global Head of Commercial Services for Roche and Genentech. Currently, he heads pathForward, providing strategic and advisory pro-bono support to non-profit organizations as well as start-ups focused on healthcare. David also serves on a number of company advisory boards and is a member of the Board of Directors of Clinica Verde, a global healthcare organization that designed and currently operates a prototype of a sustainably designed health hub in Nicaragua.

David joined Genentech in 2005 as head of US Commercial Strategy; in 2007 he became head of the US Commercial Business Practices function; and in 2011 was appointed VP and Global Head of Commercial Services for Roche Pharma Medicines, which includes Genentech in the US. Prior to joining Genentech, he spent over 23 years with Merck & Co. where he served in multiple marketing, sales, business development, medical education, and commercial operations leadership roles, including marketing, sales, business unit and franchise head positions, in Canada, the US, the Middle East and Africa and globally. David was born and grew up in Quito, Ecuador; holds Bachelor of Science and a Masters in Business Administration degrees from McGill University in Montreal, Canada; and is based in San Francisco, CA.

Michelle Drozd is a Deputy Vice President, Policy and Research at the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America. Michelle is an integral member of PhRMA’s team working on policy development and advocacy to improve adherence and appropriate use of medicines and to support access to new treatments in payment and delivery system reform. She also works on health information technology and data access policies that relate to use of prescription medicines.Prior to joining PhRMA, Michelle was a Program Director at Partners Healthcare where she supported development and implementation of strategies to reduce readmissions, manage high risk patients, improve end of life care, and develop a quality improvement training program. Michelle also worked at RTI International supporting implementation of CMS’s the Physician Group Practice Demonstration.

Michelle holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in economics and public policy from Duke University and a Master of Science degree in health policy and management from Harvard School of Public Health.

Michele Fisher, MBA, FACHE, FACMPE, CSMC is the Chief Contracting and Payer Relations Officer of UW Medicine Health System. UW Medicine Health System includes Harborview Medical Center, University of Washington Medical Center, Northwest Hospital and Medical Center, Valley Medical Center & Clinics, UW Neighborhood Clinics, UW Physicians, UW School of Medicine and Airlift Northwest. Michele has over 20 years’ experience in health care leadership positions. She has worked in health care in the Puget Sound area for the over 26 years in various business development, revenue cycle focused and clinical roles. UW Medicine is an accountable health organization (UW Medicine ACO) and has created its own UW Medicine Accountable Health Network (UW Medicine ACN).

Michele began her career at UW Medicine serving at Harborview Medical Center as the Director of Contracting and Payer Relations for nearly a year. In her current position, for over 5 years, she is responsible for the relationships with Payers, ACO negotiation and implementation (both on the ACN formation side and on the ACO direct to payer/employer side) for both the UW Medicine ACO and the UW Medicine ACN. She is also accountable for, among other items, the actuarial relationship for UW Medicine and the negotiation process of payer contracts and all aspects of payer or employer contract reporting within UW Medicine including Harborview Medical Center, UW Medical Center, Northwest Hospital, Valley Medical Center, UW Neighborhood Clinics, UW Physicians.

Before coming to UW Medicine, Michele worked in progressive leadership positions in her approximately 20 years at Overlake Hospital Medical Center, Virginia Mason Medical Center and Valley Medical Center.

Michele is a Fellow in of the American College of Healthcare Executives (FACHE), a Fellow in the American College of Medical Practice Executives (FACMPE) of the Medical Group Management Association (MGMA) Association, and CoC and CPC-h certified by AAPC (American Academy of Professional Coders). Additionally Michele is a Member of the Healthcare Financial Management Association (HFMA) and the Washington Mediation Association (WMA).

Michele has an Executive Certificate in Advanced negotiations from University of Notre Dame. She graduated from Taft University W. Edwards Deming School of Business with honors (Magna Cum Laude) with an MBA with an emphasis in Healthcare Administration, has a Bachelor of Science Degree in Finance and a Bachelors of Science Degree in Organizational behavior both from Central Washington University. Michele served several clinical roles as a Medical Assistant and ER Tech early on during her healthcare tenure.

Michele has been invited to speak locally to specialty focused special interest groups about healthcare contract trending, contract language interpretation and medical practice succession planning. Speaking nationally at ACO RISE (2013-2015) conferences and at CE events regarding Managed Care contracting. She has served as a volunteer speaker to the Washington State Academy of Pediatric Dentistry and volunteers at various venues throughout King County supporting community improvement projects and human rights.

Mark Guarraia is director of design at Ximedica, one of the world’s largest design and development consultancies focused exclusively on healthcare. He leads a talented and diverse group of designers through a human-centered approach and works with clients to design innovative medical products, services and systems. In addition to his role at Ximedica, Mark teaches at both the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD) and at the Massachusetts College of Art and Design.

Dr. John Haughton is an expert in payer-provider integration, value purchasing, risk adjustment, quality measurement, care coordination and informatics. He is the Chief Quality Officer at Independent Health, a top-rated insurer in western NY, and is the Chief Innovation Officer for the Chautauqua Affiliated Medical Partners (AMP), a provider driven ACO. With the IH team he has responsibility for performance improvement, integration and clinical quality measurement. For AMP, efforts focus on financial and clinical population management strategy and execution. AMP is a 2012 start track 1 MSSP, now in its second contract period, which moved medical expense down 10% in 12 months (from +3% at the end of the first year to -6.5% at the end of the second year, with sustained savings in year 3. During this period, quality scores increased from 76 to 92% and collection effort decreased.

He trained as a geriatric rehabilitation physician, earned a degree in electrical engineering and has first-hand patient experience from having bone cancer as a kid, “really just a systems guy trying to make care work better”. Like many in healthcare, he has been trying to find or create and deploy simple, scalable data-driven, care-focused solutions that allow health teams to easily work together across place, time and organization.

He started in patient care, leading a team-based inpatient and outpatient geriatric rehab practice, in the old shoe towns in Massachusetts, with targeted care programs that decreased inpatient utilization up to 80%. Subsequently, he and his colleagues designed and implemented two early internet native (“cloud”) care management and clinical decision support systems, Cognimed which became part of ActiveHealth and the first commercial “cloud” registry and longitudinal decision support system, DocSite taken over by Covisint. He had a stint running product and research at DxCG (now Verisk) which made the HCC risk adjusters that CMS adopted. Dr. Haughton trained at the University of Michigan and the University of Washington and lives near Annapolis Maryland with his wife Jenn and their three daughters.

Todd Hobbs, MD, is vice president and chief medical officer for Novo Nordisk in North America, where he leads the organization’s focus on the implications of diabetes for the patient, healthcare system and healthcare professionals.

Dr. Hobbs provides overall medical guidance to Novo Nordisk’s diabetes- and obesity-related projects. He provides input into the clinical development and life-cycle management strategies for diabetes and obesity, as well as medical input into the R&D; pipeline. He is involved with the optimization of relationships with top key opinion leaders and medical societies, and provides guidance to and participates in consultant advisory boards and key patient and professional associations and top thought leaders in diabetes.

Dr. Hobbs began his career at Novo Nordisk in 2004 as a field medical scientific director, then moving to the position of senior medical director, diabetes, in 2010. He led the Medical Affairs activities for all of Novo Nordisk’s current insulin products and devices, as well as supporting future insulin products through strategic and tactical activities.

In 2016, he started a 3 year term serving on the board for the American Medical Group Foundation (AMGF), the research foundation arm of the American Medical Group Association (AMGA).

Prior to working at Novo Nordisk, Dr. Hobbs had established a clinical practice based in Louisville, Kentucky, focusing on the intensive management of patients with diabetes of all ages, and served as chairman of the Medicine Department for a large Regional Medical Center in Kentucky. During this 10-year clinical career, he cared for more than 2,500 adults and children with diabetes, including outpatient and inpatient care, as well as intensive care.

Dr. Hobbs’ has a unique perspective on and personal dedication to the treatment of diabetes: his own experience with the disease began more than 25 years ago when he was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes. His passion for defeating the disease intensified even more with the diagnosis of one of his sons with the same condition at the age of five.

An internationally renowned thoracic surgeon, researcher, author and academician, Larry R. Kaiser, MD, is the leading health sciences executive at Temple University in Philadelphia, PA. He serves as CEO of the Temple University Health System, Senior Executive Vice President for the Health Sciences, and Dean of Temple University School of Medicine. Prior to joining Temple University Dr. Kaiser was the President of UTHealth, the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston from 2008 until April 1, 2011.

Dr. Kaiser graduated from Tulane University School of Medicine in 1977 and completed his internship and residency in General Surgery as well as a fellowship in Surgical Oncology at the University of California (Los Angeles). He then completed a residency in cardiovascular surgery and thoracic surgery at the University of Toronto. Following that, he served as a thoracic surgeon at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center and Assistant Professor of Surgery at Cornell University Medical College (New York) and was then recruited to Washington University School of Medicine (St. Louis) where he was promoted to Associate Professor of Surgery in 1990.

In 1991, Dr. Kaiser was recruited to the University of Pennsylvania (Philadelphia) where he held a succession of positions of increasing responsibility, including Associate Professor of Surgery, Chief of General Thoracic Surgery, Founder and Director of the university’s lung transplantation program, and Director of its Center for Lung Cancers and Related Disorders. In 1995, he was promoted to Professor of Surgery and in 1996 was named the Eldridge Eliason Professor of Surgery, the first individual to hold that chair. In 2001, following a national search, he was named the John Rhea Barton Professor and Chairman of the Department of the Department of Surgery at Penn.

In 2008, Dr. Kaiser was selected as the President of the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston. There, he was responsible for six schools, more than 10,000 faculty and trainees, and a 900-member physician practice.

Dr. Kaiser’s research and clinical interests include lung cancer, malignant mesothelioma and mediastinal tumors. He is the author or co-author of 14 books and over 250 original papers.

Dr. Kaiser has served in a number of leadership capacities for professional societies and associations, and has been a director of the American Board of Surgery and the American Board of Thoracic Surgery. In 2004, he was elected to the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences. His recent honors include citations in Castle Connolly’s “America’s Top Doctors for Cancer” 6th edition, Who’s Who in the World, and Philadelphia Magazine’s “Top Docs,” among others.

Julie Locklear, PharmD, MBA is Vice President for Health Economics & Outcomes Research (HEOR) at EMD Serono, Inc, a business of Merck KGaA, Darmstadt, Germany. Dr. Locklear joined EMD Serono, Inc. in January 2013. In this role, she is responsible for establishing the US Health Economics & Outcomes Research team within the Medical Affairs Organization. Leadership of a team responsible for developing, executing and disseminating the value evidence of EMD Serono's portfolio of specialty products in the areas of oncology, immuno-oncology, immunology, neuroscience, infertility, and endocrinology. Ensures US payer customer needs are aligned with cross-functional partners across the US and Global organizations. Leads a team of in-house HEOR researchers who generate value evidence as well as field-based HEOR team who interact with formulary decision makers.

Her previous experience includes seven years as Global Payer Evidence Director at AstraZeneca Pharmaceuticals where her responsibilities focused on the development of successful global reimbursement dossiers across multiple therapeutic areas including inflammation, respiratory, neuroscience and autoimmune disorders. She has experience launching products, business development, market access, leading cross functional internal teams (direct and indirect management), external contract research organizations, and alliance management.

Prior to AstraZeneca, she worked for Janssen Pharmaceutica in a variety of health economic roles including both in-house and customer facing. Dr. Locklear received her Doctor of Pharmacy from the University of Rhode Island and a Masters in Business Administration from Saint Joseph’s University. She currently sits on the board of Network for Excellence in Health Innovation (NEHI) and sits on a number of executive-level real-world evidence (RWE) roundtable discussions.

Catherine Macpherson is the Vice President of Adherence for Walgreens. Before joining Walgreens, she spent 6 years at WebMD, where as a Senior Director, she managed a business line of health, wellness and behavior change programs, including health risk assessment, biometric screenings and flu shots, digital coaching, health coaching, obesity management, tobacco cessation and disease management programs. These services were delivered by health professionals and via digital experience.

Prior to WebMD, Catherine managed a portfolio of health and wellness products for Ceridian, a business services provider and developed health coaching programs for Leade Health. Before that, Catherine worked to address one of the leading national health issues, obesity, by overseeing the Weight-control Information Network (WIN), an obesity information clearing house and call center from the National Institute of Diabetes, Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK), part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). Catherine also worked to prevent cancer at the American Institute for Cancer Research, where she served as the Assistant Director of Education, writing for and editing publications about the link between a healthy diet, lifestyle and cancer prevention.

Catherine earned her Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, and her Master of Science degree in human nutrition from the University of Minnesota. Catherine, who is a registered dietitian, is passionate about promoting wellness professionally, as well as in her community.

Igor Rudychev is the Director of Commercial Analytics, Resource Allocation Team Leader at Pfizer.

Igor has 20+ years of the analytics experience and for the last 15 years he has been specializing in the Pharmaceutical Data Analytics, Patient-Level Data (APLD), Sales & Marketing Analytics, Resource Allocation & Optimization, Brand Analytics, and Forecasting.

Prior to joining Pfizer, Igor was a Vice President of Operations with Bayser, Management Consulting firm in Chicago, where he provided strategic and analytical insights to the top 20 global pharmaceutical companies. Igor talks at major pharmaceutical & forecasting conferences also published extensively in the trade & peer review journals (including CBI, ASCO, AMCP, MMM, PDT, PMSA, etc.)

Igor has an MBA from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business and PhD in Theoretical Physics (Superstring Theory & Black Holes) from Texas A&M; University.

Michael Taitel, PhD is a Senior Director of Clinical Outcomes & Reporting at Walgreens and has been with the company since 2010. He leads a team of analysts responsible for conducting clinical outcomes studies and predictive analytics to support Walgreen’s health and wellness initiatives in retail pharmacy and in product innovation. He brings extensive expertise in behavior change, health risk assessment, wellness and disease management evaluation, productivity, immunization, and medication adherence.

Dr. Taitel offers insights into conducting behavioral and clinical research in applied settings and presenting results to key decision makers. He often presents at national forums and is the author of numerous peer-reviewed articles.

Dr. Taitel previously served as Vice President for the Alere Center for Health Intelligence. He was responsible for research studies on behavior change, health risk assessment, wellness savings, medication adherence, and productivity. Earlier, Dr. Taitel was Clinical Director at First Health, where he conceived, developed, and evaluated managed care and disease management product and performance innovations.

Dr. Taitel holds a doctorate in experimental health psychology from Ohio University and a master’s degree in clinical psychology from Bowling Green State University. He is a member of the American Psychological Association, International Society for Pharmacoeconomics and Outcomes Research, and Society of Behavioral Medicine.