AcademyHealth Announces 2017 Delivery System Science Fellows

Washington, D.C. Oct. 6, 2017—AcademyHealth announced today the four individuals selected for the 2017 AcademyHealth Delivery System Science Fellowship (DSSF) and their respective placements. Drs. Michael P. Cary Jr., Kunhee Lucy Kim, Hyewon Lee, and Liron Sinvani recently began their year-long paid, postdoctoral Fellowship at four of the nation’s leading health systems this fall.

Now in its seventh year, the DSSF is a professional development opportunity for highly qualified, doctorally prepared individuals who are interested in enhancing and applying their analytic skills to relevant and timely research topics in a delivery system setting. The ultimate goal of the Fellowship is to increase the capacity of the health services research workforce by providing experiential-learning opportunities in delivery system settings.  

“To address persistent challenges and transform health care, we need a diverse and well-prepared workforce that represents a variety of perspectives,” said AcademyHealth Vice President of Evidence Generation and Translation Dr. Margo Edmunds. “This unique Fellowship connects talented health services researchers with the nations’ leading delivery systems, helping them to better use evidence to improve quality of care.”

Individuals from across the broad field of health services research in addition to delivery system science, and public and population health fields are encouraged to apply. 

The 2017 Fellows were selected through a competitive process that included evaluation by a national expert peer review panel and host site preceptors. Brief biographies of each Fellow are as follows:

Michael P. Cary Jr., Ph.D., RN
Host Site: Department of Veterans Affairs

Dr. Cary is an assistant professor in the School of Nursing, senior fellow in the Center for the Study of Aging and Human Development, and core faculty member in the Center for Biobehavioral Health Disparities Research at Duke University. In his research, he uses large datasets and advanced analytics to: 1) better understand risk factors for complications and adverse outcomes (functional decline and rehospitalizations) among older adults with medically complex conditions treated in PAC settings and 2) measure quality in PAC settings to promote performance improvements. 

Dr. Cary earned a Bachelor’s degree in Health Services Administration from James Madison University.  He also holds Bachelor’s, Master’s, and Ph.D. degrees in Nursing from the University of Virginia.

Kunhee Lucy Kim, Ph.D.
Host Site: NYU Langone Medical Center

Dr. Kunhee Lucy Kim completed her Ph.D. in health care management and economics at the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania. Her dissertation research focused on the determinants and quality implications of health care workforce configuration in the home health space. Using novel proprietary data from a home health company, she examined the impact of temporary nurses on patient outcomes; home health offices’ temporary-permanent labor mix strategy; and the impact of care discontinuity on patient outcomes. Under the DSSF, Dr. Kim is currently working on largely two areas in health care delivery: post-acute care and physician practice decisions. In post-acute care, she is exploring the determinants of hospitals’ vertical integration decisions with post-acute care; the impact of hospital readmissions penalty program on the practice patterns in post-acute care; and the value of home health care. In her research on physician practice decisions, she is exploring physicians’ computer technology adoption decisions as strategies to cope with malpractice lawsuit risks or to complement skills. The DSSF will allow DR. Kim to develop expertise in the complex organizational structures and incentives in diverse health care delivery system settings and advance her research on managerial and organizational challenges and public policies that affect them.

Hyewon Lee, D.M.D., M.P.H.
Host Site: DentaQuest Institute

Dr. Hyewon Lee is a public health professional specialized in health policy development and analysis, strategic planning, and program development for children and pregnant women. She led and co-led development of multiple policy resolutions, including the Declaration on Access to Oral Health for Children published by the World Federation of Public Health Associations. At the Department of Health and Human Services of the United States, Health Resources and Services Administration, she was the agency lead for Healthy People 2020 Oral Health Chapter and was closely involved with the publication of "Oral Health during Pregnancy: National Consensus Statement". Dr. Lee usually spends her vacation in Africa, where she and her husband run a non-profit organization to provide art-integrated education to children in rural communities in Kenya.

Liron Sinvani, M.D.
Host Site: Northwell Health

As a geriatrician-hospitalist and researcher, Dr. Sinvani has observed the consequences of hospitalization in older adults, often resulting in iatrogenic complications such as Hospital Associated Disability (HAD), delirium, and transition fragmentation. Her overall goal is to develop and test interventions to consistently integrate evidence-based geriatric practices into Hospital Medicine in order to improve short-term and long-term outcomes for this population that she was trained to serve. The systematic integration of established best practices through health information technology has the potential to better standardize care for vulnerable elders. Specifically, Dr. Sinvani seeks to test the usability and integration of checklist interventions into the electronic medical record, throughout a multi-center health system. As an AcademyHealth Delivery Systems Science Fellow, Dr. Sinvani hopes to learn more about the methods behind systems and applied research as well as to use these methods to discover how information technology can effectively assist in the implementation of evidenced-based medicine, which is essential to providing high quality care for a growing population. She has the good fortune to be part of a strong and supportive group of colleagues working together in the Northwell Health System, which groups 21 hospitals within the greater New York metropolitan tristate area and serves patients with enormously diverse backgrounds. This organizational structure and size of the network provides her with exceptional opportunities to rigorously assess the impact of implementing large-scale interventions of geriatric-focused best practices.

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About the DSSF Fellowship

The goal of the DSSF Fellowship is to provide hands-on training and professional opportunities for highly qualified researchers with a background in health services research (HSR) or related fields to enhance analytic skills and ultimately increase the capacity of the HSR workforce. To learn more about the AcademyHealth DSSF Fellowship, visit http://www.academyhealth.org/dssf.

About AcademyHealth

AcademyHealth is a leading national organization serving the fields of health services and policy research and the professionals who produce and use this important work. Together with our members, we offer programs and services that support the development and use of rigorous, relevant and timely evidence to increase the quality, accessibility, and value of health care, to reduce disparities, and to improve health. A trusted broker of information, AcademyHealth brings stakeholders together to address the current and future needs of an evolving health system, inform health policy, and translate evidence into action. Learn more at www.academyhealth.org and follow us on Twitter @AcademyHealth.