Current Fellows

• Naomi Bardach, MD
• Laura Eaton, MD, MPH
• Vicki Fung, PhD
• Coline McConnel, MA
• Peter McNair, MPH
• Donna Odierna, DrPH
• Megumi (Megi) Okumura, MD
• Nancy Oliva, MS, MPA, MHA
• Elizabeth (Betsy) Pohlman, MA
• Rosemary Polanco, PhD
• Darci Powell, PhD
• Mary Reed, DrPH
• Kim Rhoads, MD, MS, MPH

Naomi Bardach, MD Discipline: General Pediatrics/Health Policy

Naomi Bardach is a fellow with the Department of General Pediatrics and a part-time postdoctoral scholar in the Philip R. Lee Institute for Health Policy Studies/Institute for Health & Aging Transdisciplinary Health Policy Research Training Program. Dr. Bardach received her medical degree in 2003 from UCSF and completed her residency and chief residency in the UCSF Department of Pediatrics. Her research focuses on the use of health information technology in chronic disease care for adults and children.  She is collaborating with the Kaiser Division of Research to evaluate the implementation of an integrated health information technology system and it’s effect on patient care outcomes.

Laura Eaton, MD, MPH Discipline: Family Medicine

Laura Eaton received her medical degree in family medicine from the University of Medicine & Dentistry of New Jersey in 2002. She is a joint postdoctoral scholar in the UCSF Department of Family and Community Medicine and the IHPS/IHA Health Services Research Training Program. Her research focuses on physician workforce economics with respect to gender; the impact of gender concordance between patient and physician and its resulting patient case mix on the gender wage gap among family medicine and primary care physicians; and costs for episodes of care.

Vicki Fung, PhD Discipline: Health Services and Policy Analysis

Vicki Fung is a Staff Scientist at Kaiser Permanente Northern California, Division of Research, and a part-time postdoctoral scholar in the Philip R. Lee Institute for Health Policy Studies/Institute for Health & Aging Transdisciplinary Health Services Research Training Program. Dr. Fung received her doctorate in Health Services and Policy Analysis from the UC Berkeley School of Public Health in 2006 and a Bachelor of Arts degree in economics from Yale University. Her research examines how policy-and system-level changes affect patient behaviors, health outcomes, and medical costs, with a focus on the effects of health insurance benefit design and patient cost-sharing. As part of this work, she has a particular interest in the new Medicare prescription drug benefit. Dr. Fung’s other research interests include health and health care disparities, patterns of medication use and adherence, and the emerging role of health information technology.

Coline McConnel, MA Discipline: Sociology

Coline McConnel is a predoctoral fellow in the Philip R. Lee Institute for Health Policy Studies/Institute for Health & Aging Transdisciplinary Health Policy Research Training Program.  She received a master's degree in social and personality psychology from the University of California Berkeley in 2000. Her dissertation research utilizes perspectives on globalization to analyze the politics and health outcomes of HIV prevention and treatment roll-out in Kisumu, Kenya. Ms. McConnel anticipates receiving her doctorate in sociology in 2008 from the UCSF Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences.

Peter McNair, MPH Discipline: Health Services and Health Policy

Peter McNair, M.P.H., a 2007–08 Commonwealth Fund Harkness Fellow in Health Care Policy and Practice, is senior policy analyst in the Funding Policy Unit in the Australian Department of Human Services, having previously worked in the Metropolitan Health Service Performance Management and Clinical Information Units. His work focuses on the development of funding and service planning policy and the implementation of innovative policy solutions to improve health care quality. In addition to reports published for the Victorian Department of Human Services, McNair has published in the Australian and New Zealand Journal of Medicine and Australian Health Review. McNair earned a master's of health science from Latrobe University, a master's of public health in clinical epidemiology from Monash University, and a bachelor's of nursing from Phillip Institute of Technology.

Donna Odierna, DrPH Discipline: Public Health

Donna Odierna received her doctoral degree in 2006 from the University of California- Berkeley, School of Public Health. Dr. Odierna is an Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality fellow in the IHPS/IHA Health Services Research Training Program. Her area of research concentration is on social epidemiology—social determinants of health inequalities, social determinants of health in aging and in obesity, social marginalization /social exclusion and health.

Megumi (Megi) Okumura, MD Discipline: Internal Medicine (Pediatrics)

Megumi Okumura received her medical degree from the New York Medical College in 2000. Dr. Okumura is a joint scholar with the Division of General Pediatrics and the IHPS/IHA Health Services Research Training Program. She is a clinician investigator whose research agenda includes the assessment of and improvement in the quality of care for adolescents and young adults with chronic conditions of childhood onset. She also is looking at the differences in the systems of health care delivered between pediatric and adult health care settings and how the differences can be translated into improvements in overall quality of care.

Nancy Oliva, MS, MPA, MHA Discipline: Health Services Research

Nancy Oliva received her masters degrees with honors in Health Services Management and in Public Administration/Finance from the University of Missouri, and a masters degree in Counseling Psychology from Dominican University. She will complete her doctoral dissertation in 2008 in Health Policy in the UCSF Department of Social & Behavioral Sciences/School of Nursing. The focus of her dissertation is the effect of protocol-guided RN case management on the frequency and estimated costs of ED and inpatient readmissions in community-dwelling, older adults with 1 or more chronic illnesses. Nancy’s research focuses on the organization and delivery of quality care to older adults, chronic care systems and acute inpatient care transitions to home or other community settings. Additional research interests include the impact of health literacy on self-care capacity, patient safety and health status, and the design and delivery of language-accessible and culturally-competent health care services for limited English proficiency health care consumers.

Elizabeth (Betsy) Pohlman, MA Discipline: Medical Anthropology

Betsy Pohlman is a doctoral student in the UC Berkeley and UCSF Joint Program in Medical Anthropology and an Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality predoctoral trainee in the IHPS/IHA Health Services Research Training Program. The title of Ms. Pohlman’s dissertation is Alzheimer’s Disease in Two Populations: A Comparative Study. She is doing ethnographic research on two groups with cognitive disability: those with Alzheimer’s disease and those with Down syndrome. Ms. Pohlman will complete her dissertation research in 2008.

Rosemary Polanco, PhD Discipline: Medical Anthropology and Latino Studies   Rosemary Polanco received her doctorate in 2006 from the University of Chicago. Dr. Polanco is an Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality fellow in the IHPS/IHA Health Services Research Health Services Research Training Program. Her primary research focus is on issues that affect Latino communities, particularly HIV/AIDS policies. She is examining disparities in published HIV/AIDS randomized clinical trials and looking at the role of culture in HIV/AIDS treatment adherence among Bay Area Latinos. Darci Powell, PhD Discipline: Sociology/Public Policy   Darci Powell earned a doctorate in Sociology with a minor in Public Policy from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 2007. She is currently a postdoctoral fellow in the Philip R. Lee Institute for Health Policy Studies/Institute for Health & Aging Transdisciplinary Health Policy Research Training Program. Dr. Powell’s research interests include adolescence, the family and social and health disparities; her current research involves the creation of fact sheets regarding community indoor and outdoor air quality for the Community Action to Fight Asthma in California. Mary Reed, DrPH Discipline: Public Health   Mary Reed received her doctorate in public health from the University of California, Berkeley in 2005. She is a joint postdoctoral scholar with IHPS/IHA Health Services Research Training program and the Kaiser Permanente Research Division, Oakland. Her research focus is on patient cost-sharing—including high-deductible plans, prescription drug costs, and Medicare Part D. She is also interested in health information technology—including use patterns by patients and clinicians; and chronic care delivery—including coordination of care, disparities, and barriers to patient adherence to therapy. Kim Rhoads, MD, MS, MPH Discipline: General Surgery   Kim Rhoads received her medical degree in 1998 from UCSF, her masters degree in Health and Medical Science from the UC Berkeley School of Public Health, and her masters in Public Health from Harvard School of Public Health. She is a board certified general surgeon who most recently completed subspecialty training at UCSF in colorectal surgery. Currently she is a postdoctoral research fellow at the Philip R. Lee Institute for Health Policy Studies. Dr. Rhoads has extensive research experience in translational basic science research, qualitative methods and secondary data analysis.  She has published many peer-reviewed journal articles and case reports, and has authored multiple book chapters, in both general and colorectal surgery texts.  Her current research focuses on the impact of statewide quality improvement efforts and public reporting on postoperative cancer survival in California.