AUSTIN, Texas — Elizabeth Teisberg, co-creator of the idea of value-based health care strategy and an internationally recognized author and professor, is joining the Dell Medical School at The University of Texas at Austin — the first new medical school in decades to be built from the ground up at a top-tier research university.
“Elizabeth is a visionary. She wasn’t just ahead of the curve on value-based health care. She helped design the curve that so much of the health care industry is now exploring,” said Clay Johnston, inaugural dean of the Dell Medical School. “With so many people, companies, institutions and agencies moving toward the ideas she helped originate, Elizabeth will play a vital role in making Austin a national epicenter for health care transformation.”
Teisberg will serve on the medical school’s faculty and leadership team, providing a vital bridge to other academic units, including the Cockrell School of Engineering, the Austin Regional Campus of The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston (UTHealth) School of Public Health, and the McCombs School of Business. Within the medical school, she will work across departments, lending her deep expertise to such diverse efforts as strategy development, business model creation, person-centered results measurement, and design of full cycle, integrated care services.
Teisberg is the co-author, with Michael Porter of the Harvard Business School, of “Redefining Health Care: Creating Value-Based Competition on Results,” the definitive 2006 book that envisioned value-based strategy. The book called for widespread transformation of care in ways that create better health outcomes for individuals and reduce the costs of achieving those outcomes. The Economist magazine called the book “a profound and powerful critique of America’s health-care system.”
“Joining the Dell Med team is a fabulous opportunity. The school has great people with a clear mandate to create both health care services and medical education that improve value for patients, families and the community. While other medical schools are working to include value in their curricula, Dell Med is unique in its all-encompassing focus on value: improving meaningful health outcomes in ways that lower costs,” Teisberg said. “The school’s blank canvas is an opportunity to create demonstrations of high-value care, measure what matters to patients and families, and employ entrepreneurial business models with payment that rewards good health results.”
Teisberg’s expertise in implementing person-centered, value-based care will help the medical school realize its mission of revolutionizing the way people get and stay healthy.
Teisberg recently spoke at the National Summit on Patient Experience: Innovation and Empathy about her forthcoming book, “Capability, Comfort and Calm: Designing Health Care Services for Excellence and Empathy.” It is co-authored with Scott Wallace, who also recently joined the Dell Medical School faculty.
Teisberg has won the Wachovia Award for outstanding research, the Frederick S. Morton Award for Leadership, and the Book of the Year Award from the American College of Health Care Executives. She comes to Dell Medical School from Dartmouth College’s Geisel School of Medicine and was previously on the faculty of the University of Virginia’s Graduate School of Business and the Harvard Business School. She earned an M.S. and a Ph.D. from the Stanford University School of Engineering. She also holds a Master of Engineering degree from the University of Virginia and an A.B. degree, summa cum laude, from Washington University in St. Louis.
Read the Q&A with Dr. Teisberg to learn more about her experience and her vision for value-based care in Austin and beyond.
