AUSTIN, TexasDr. Mark B. McClellan, a highly distinguished and leading health scholar and policy maker, has been appointed as a Visiting Fellow in Health Policy at the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs at The University of Texas at Austin, it was announced today by James Steinberg, dean of the LBJ School.
McClellan will also serve as the Chancellor’s Health Fellow in Health Policy working with the Office of Health Affairs in the University of Texas System. McClellan, a University of Texas at Austin graduate, holds a number of prominent positions at the Brookings Institution: senior fellow, director of the Engelberg Center for Healthcare Reform and the Leonard D. Schaeffer Chair in Health Policy Studies.
Steinberg said, “We’re delighted to have Mark’s expertise joined with the distinguished researchers and educators in the LBJ School’s Center for Health and Social Policy to address issues involving the cost, quality and delivery of medical services for culturally and economically diverse communities across the state and nation. Mark’s background will fit well with the interdisciplinary nature of the LBJ School in finding innovative perspectives and strategies for translating evidence-based research outcomes to achieving meaningful change into the policy arena.”
McClellan said of his appointment, “I intend to use this opportunity to work with the leading scholars of the LBJ School and the University of Texas, as well as many other old friends and colleagues in Texas, to improve health care and health in Texas and the nation.”
Dr. Kenneth Shine, executive vice chancellor for health affairs in the UT System and immediate past president of the Institute of Medicine noted, “Texas has important opportunities to benefit from the wisdom and experience of Dr. McClellan in confronting its major challenges for health.”
McClellan has a highly distinguished record in public service and in academic research. He is the former administrator for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (2004-06) and the former commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration (2002-04). He also served as a member of the President’s Council of Economic Advisers and senior director for health care policy at the White House (2001-02). In these positions, he developed and implemented major reforms in health policy.
- The Medicare prescription drug benefit and other innovative coverage options, including the move from indemnity insurance to personalized, prevention-oriented care;
- Innovative approaches to coverage in Medicaid and the State Children’s Health Insurance Program, including roadmaps that states have used to update and expand coverage and the “Money Follows the Person” initiatives in long-term care;
- The development of the FDA’s Critical Path initiative, regulatory reforms to modernize pharmaceutical manufacturing, efficient risk-management methods to better address safety issues, and reforms to speed the approval of low-cost generic medicines and improve the availability of safe and effective treatments; and
- Public-private initiatives to develop better information on the quality and cost of care, and steps to help consumers and providers use this information to improve care, including performance-based provider payment reforms, and Health Savings Accounts and Health Reimbursement Arrangements.
In the Clinton administration, McClellan was deputy assistant secretary of the treasury for economic policy from 1998-99, supervising economic analysis and policy development on a range of domestic policy issues.
McClellan was also an associate professor of economics and associate professor of medicine (with tenure) at Stanford University, from which he was on leave during his government service. He directed Stanford’s Program on Health Outcomes Research and was also associate editor of the Journal of Health Economics, and co-principal investigator of the Health and Retirement Study (HRS), a longitudinal study of the health and economic status of older Americans. His academic research has been concerned with the effectiveness of medical treatments in improving health, the economic and policy factors influencing medical treatment decisions and health outcomes, the impact of new technologies on public health and medical expenditures, and the relationship between health status and economic well being. He has twice received the Kenneth J. Arrow Award for Outstanding Research in Health Economics.
McClellan is a member of the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences, a research associate of the National Bureau of Economic Research and a visiting scholar at the American Enterprise Institute.
McClellan was born and raised in Austin, Texas, and is a graduate of The University of Texas at Austin (Plan II). He earned his M.P.A. from Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government in 1991, his M.D. from the Harvard-MIT Division of Health Sciences and Technology in 1992, and his Ph.D. in economics from MIT in 1993. He completed his residency training in internal medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Boston.
McClellan has been board-certified in Internal Medicine and has been a practicing internist during his academic career.
For more information contact: Susan Binford, 512-232-4006.
