COMMITTEE CHAIR

John D. Stobo, M.D.

John D. Stobo graduated medical school at the State University of New York in Buffalo in 1968. He then completed two years of training on the Osler Medical Service at the Johns Hopkins Hospital, two years as a research associate at the National Institutes of Health and one year as chief medical resident on the Osler Medical Service at Johns Hopkins. Dr. Stobo went on to be an assistant professor for three years at the Department of Immunology at the Mayo Clinic. From 1976 to 1985, he served as head of the Section of Rheumatology and Clinical Immunology at the University of California, San Francisco where he was also an investigator with the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. In 1985, he returned to Johns Hopkins as the William Osler Professor of Medicine and Physician-in-Chief of the Johns Hopkins Hospital. In 1997, Dr. Stobo became the President of The University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston.

COMMITTEE ViceCHAIR

Frank S. Bloch, J.D., Ph.D.

Frank Bloch is Professor of Law, Vanderbilt University Law School, which he joined in 1979. He was director of clinical education from 1979-2001. Prior to 1979, he taught at the University of Chicago Law School. Before he began teaching, he was a legal aid lawyer with California Rural Legal Assistance (1971-1973). Professor Bloch is an expert in social security, disability, and other benefits programs. He is also very active in the international clinical education movement.
Prof. Bloch earned his B.A. from Brandeis University (1966), his J.D. from Columbia University (1969), and a Ph.D. in politics from Brandeis University (1978). Professor Bloch has served as a Fulbright Professor in India and as a research fellow at the International Social Security Association in Geneva, Switzerland. He has also served as a consultant to the Administrative Conference of the United States and the Social Security Advisory Board. He is author of "Bloch on Social Security Disability," issued annually since 1995, "Disability Benefit Claim Processing and Appeals in Six Industrialized Countries" (1994), and "Disability Determination: The Administrative Process and the Role of Medical Personnel" (1992) and co-editor of "Who Returns to Work and Why? A Six-Country Study on Work Incapacity and Reintegration" (2001). He is a former chair of the American Bar Association's Income Security Committee, Section of Administrative Law and Regulatory Practice. He is a member of the bar of California and Tennessee.


COMMITTEE MEMBERS

Gunnar B. J. Andersson, M.D., Ph.D.

Gunnar B. J. Andersson is Professor and Chairman, Department of Orthopedic Surgery at Rush University Medical Center. Having been the Chairman for over ten years he has also been the Vice Dean for Surgical Sciences and Services, Senior Vice President of Medical Affairs and President of the Medical Staff, each for two year periods. Dr. Andersson received his M.D. from the University of Goteborg, Sweden, did his residency at Sahlgren University Hospital there and also obtained a Ph.D. in Medical Science at the University of Goteborg in 1974. After a fellowship at the London Hospital, he joined the faculty at the University of Goteborg for 10 years. In 1985 he moved to the United States and Rush University Medical Center. Dr. Andersson is a member of numerous medical societies and committees, a past president of the Orthopaedic Research Society and the International Society for the Study of the Lumbar Spine, and current Chair of the Research Committee at the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons. He just finished a four year period as a member of the Council of the National Institutes of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases at NIH. He has been a member of the U.S. National Safety Council and on the Steering Committee of the National Research Council for the Workshop on Work Related Musculoskeletal Injuries. Dr. Andersson is a member of 15 editorial boards. He is a Deputy Editor for Spine, Editor-in-Chief of Contemporary Spine Surgery, and an Associate Editor of Clinical Biomechanics. He is the author of over 220 original articles and 150 books and book chapters. He was the Senior Editor of the Guides to the Evaluation of Permanent Impairment, 5th Edition (2000) and Co-Editor of Disability Evaluation, 2nd Edition (2003), both published by AMA.

Richard V. Burkhauser, Ph.D.

Richard V. Burkhauser is Sarah Gibson Blanding Professor of Policy Analysis and Chair of the Department of Policy Analysis and Management, Cornell University. His professional career has focused on how public policies affect the economic behavior and well-being of vulnerable populations, e.g., people with disabilities, older persons, low income households. He has published widely on these topics in journals of demography, economics, gerontology, as well as public policy. Dr. Burkhauser is Co-Principal Investigator (PI) on the Department of Education-funded Rehabilitation Research and Training Center (RRTC) for Economic Research on Employment Policy for Persons with Disabilities. He is also Co-PI of the RRTC on Disability Demographics and Statistics. As Co-PI of these RRTCs, he has carried out an extensive program of technical assistance and presentations to government agencies, policymakers and consumers on the employment and economic well-being of people with disabilities.
Dr. Burkhauser received his B.A. from St. Vincent College (1967) and his Ph.D. in economics from the University of Chicago (1976). Prior to coming to Cornell in 1990, he was on the faculty of Vanderbilt University and the Maxwell School at Syracuse University. His most recent work on social security policies toward people with disabilities include his co-authorship of The Economics of an Aging Society (2004) and co-editorship of The Decline in Employment of People with Disabilities: A Policy Puzzle (2003).

Diana D. Cardenas, M.D., MHA

Diana D. Cardenas is Professor, Department of Rehabilitation Medicine, University of Washington, and Chief of Service, Department of Rehabilitation Medicine, Clinical Director, Spinal Cord Injury Service, and Director, Spinal Cord Injury Clinic, University of Washington Medical Center. Her research interests include chronic pain in spinal cord injuries, prevention of urinary tract infections in people with spinal cord injuries, and bladder management. She is the Project Director of the Northwest Regional Spinal Cord Injury System.
Dr. Cardenas teaches PM&R residents and medical students. She is a member of the University of Washington Medical Center's Medical Leadership Council, Medical Staff Administrative Committee, and Medical Quality Improvement Committee. Dr. Cardenas earned her B.A. degree at the University of Texas (1969) and her medical degree at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical School (1973). She earned her M.S. (1976), and M.H.A. (2001) degrees and completed her residency in PM&R (1976) at the University of Washington, Seattle, WA. Prior to joining the faculty of the University of Washington in 1981, she was in the Department of Rehabilitation Medicine at Emory University. Dr. Cardenas is board certified in PM&R and Electrodiagnostic Medicine. She is a Fellow of the American Congress of Rehabilitation Medicine and former Chair, Research Advisory and Advocacy Committee, American Academy of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation. She is a member of the IOM.

Sheila T. Fitzgerald, Ph.D., MSN

Sheila Fitzgerald is Associate Professor, Department of Environmental Health Sciences, John Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Her research interests are in the occupational health of young workers, the antecedents of adult work stress, and the occupational health of women with chronic diseases. Her current research includes a longitudinal study of working adolescent and young adults and the factors such as job stress that contribute to the development of cardiovascular disease later in life and a study of the factors that influence return to work after diagnosis of a chronic disease.
Dr. Fitzgerald received her B.S. from the University of Wisconsin (1968), MSN from the University of Pennsylvania (1973), ANP from the University of Maryland (1981), and Ph.D. from the Johns Hopkins School of Hygiene and Public Health (1987). She is certified as an Adult Nurse Practitioner by the American Nursing Association. She is a member of the Johns Hopkins University Disability Advisory committee and was a member of the Medical and Insurance Subcommittee of the President's Committee on Employment of People with Disabilities (1992-1994).

Arthur “Tim” Garson, Jr., M.D., MPH

Arthur “Tim” Garson assumed the position of the Dean of the School of Medicine and Vice President of the University of Virginia in June 2002. He graduated from Princeton University in 1970 and received his M.D. from Duke University in 1974, remaining there for his pediatric residency. In 1979, he completed a pediatric cardiology fellowship at Baylor College of Medicine and joined its faculty in 1985. He was named chief of pediatric cardiology in 1988.
In 1992, he received a master’s degree in public health, specializing in health policy and health care finance, from the University of Texas in Houston, and he was recruited to Duke to be associate vice chancellor of health affairs. While there, much of his work focused on health policy. Three years later he returned to Houston and became senior vice president and dean for academic operations at Baylor and vice president of Texas Children’s Hospital.
Dr. Garson has an extensive history of national and international service to in the field of pediatric cardiology, specifically sudden death in children and adolescents. He was president of the American College of Cardiology from 2000-2001, and he continues to contribute to the organization through membership on its Board of Trustees and on several of its committees, including Government Relations and Quality of Care. He serves on the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality National Advisory Council. In 2001, he was appointed a member of a White House Advisory Panel on Health System Improvement. Dr. Garson helps strengthen and guide medical education through his service to the Association of American Medical Colleges, the University Hospitals Consortium and the Association of Academic Health Centers.

Kristofer J. Hagglund, Ph.D.

Kristofer J. Hagglund is the Associate Dean of Health Policy and Professor of Health Psychology in the School of Health Professions at the University of Missouri - Columbia. He was a 2000-2001 Robert Wood Johnson Health Policy Fellow in the Office of Senator Tom Harkin, where he worked on legislation addressing patients' rights, mental health parity, rural health care, community health centers, and the National Health Service Corps. Dr. Hagglund has an active research program and has published in the areas of adaptation to chronic illnesses and disabilities, health care delivery systems for people with chronic illness or disabilities, and professional issues. He is a co-principal investigator of the Missouri Model Spinal Cord Injury System, a five-year research and demonstration project funded by the National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research. He is co-principal investigator of the Missouri Arthritis Rehabilitation Research and Training Center, where he is completing a study of health care delivery systems for people with arthritis. Dr. Hagglund also co-directs the Center for Health Policy at the University of Missouri-Columbia, which is addressing health insurance and health disparity issues in Missouri. Dr. Hagglund obtained a B.A. in psychology from Illinois State University and a Ph.D. in Clinical (Medical) Psychology from the University of Alabama at Birmingham. He is a diplomate of the American Board of Professional Psychology and a Fellow of the American Psychological Association (APA). He is immediate past president of the Division of Rehabilitation Psychology of APA.

Allen W. Heinemann, Ph.D.

Allen W. Heinemann completed his doctoral degree in Clinical Psychology at the University of Kansas with a specialty focus in rehabilitation. He completed an internship at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston and was an Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychology at Illinois Institute of Technology. Since 1985, he has worked at the Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago (RIC) where he directs the Center for Rehabilitation Outcomes Research, a rehabilitation-focused health services research unit. He is also Associate Director of Research at RIC and Professor in the Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation at the Feinberg School of Medicine, Northwestern University. He serves on the Coordinating Committee for Northwestern University's Institute for Health Services Research and Policy Studies. His research interests focus on health services research, psychosocial aspects of rehabilitation including substance abuse, and measurement issues in rehabilitation.

Ronald Leopold, M.D., MBA, MPH

Ronald Leopold is National Medical Director and Vice President of MetLife Disability. He is a board certified occupational medicine physician who holds a Masters in Business Administration from The Wharton School and a Masters in Public Health from Boston University. He is an active member of the American College of Occupational and Environmental Medicine. Dr. Leopold currently serves as clinical thought leader for MetLife Disability and has recently developed the MetLife Disability Durations Guidelines and MetLife's Clinical Triage Claims Model. His role includes clinical program development, industry thought leadership, clinical data analysis and new product development. In addition, Dr. Leopold's work includes benefits solutions consultation with MetLife corporate customers.
Dr. Leopold recently published a book, A Year in the Life of a Million American Workers, a visual guide to the major injuries and illnesses affecting American workers which examines industry-specific norms and suggests risk reduction programs for getting employees back to work. The book provides quantitative and qualitative information and benchmarks that employers need to identify occupational health problems in their workforce and identify intervention programs to prevent or reduce problems that result in absences. Ron has also worked in managed workers compensation where he was involved in the development and management of a national provider network. He also authored a book on the Internet for occupational health professionals (1997).

Larry G. Massanari

Larry G. Massanari was Acting Commissioner of Social Security for eight months during 2001, serving until the current Commissioner was appointed. Prior to that, he had served as the Philadelphia Regional Commissioner for the Social Security Administration (SSA) for 14 years, where he directed Agency operations in the Mid-Atlantic States.
A graduate of Western Michigan University, Mr. Massanari has also done graduate work at Northwestern University. Mr. Massanari began his career at SSA in 1966 as a claims representative in one of the field offices. He served in a variety of administrative and managerial positions in the Chicago area before moving to the Agency's headquarters in 1979. He held several top level positions in SSA's central office, including Director of Human Resources and Associate Commissioner for Policy. He was named Regional Commissioner for the Philadelphia Region in 1987. Mr. Massanari was a Presidential Executive rank award winner in 1992, 1997, and 2002, receiving the rank of both Meritorious and Distinguished Executive. He has been the recipient of three Commissioner's Citations, the highest honor conferred upon SSA employees. In 1990, he received the first Commissioner's Leadership Award. In 2003, he received the National Public Service Award from the American Society for Public Administration and the Roger W. Jones Award for Executive Leadership from American University.

Stephen G. Pauker, M.D.

Stephen G. Pauker is Vice Chairman for Clinical Affairs and Associate Physician-in-Chief, Tufts-New England Medical Center, and Professor of Medicine and Professor of Psychiatry, Tufts University School of Medicine. He is an expert on clinical decision making and evidence-based medicine and founded the Division of Clinical Decision Making at tufts-NEMC. Dr. Pauker is board certified in internal medicine and cardiovascular diseases, as well as in medical hypnosis. He is a member of numerous professional societies including the American College of Cardiology, the American College of Medical Informatics, the American College of Physicians, the American Federation for Medical Research, the American Heart Association, the American Medical Association, the American Society of Clinical Hypnosis, the American Society of Clinical Investigation, the Association of American Physicians, and the Society for Medical Decision Making (who awarded him their Career Achievement Award). Dr. Pauker is a Master of the American College of Physicians. His publications and research have addressed decision making for both health policy and individual patients. Dr. Pauker practices internal medicine and cardiology.
He has served on a number of IOM and NAS committees, including the Committee to Evaluate the Artificial Heart Program of the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute; Workshops on the National Institutes of Health Consensus Development Process and the Use of Drugs in the Elderly; Committee on Thyroid Screening Related to I-131 Exposure; Committee on Extending Medicare Coverage for Preventive and Other Services; Committee on Regulating Occupational Exposure to Tuberculosis TB in Workplace, and Committee to Assess the Scientific Information for the Radiation Exposure Screening and Education Program.
Dr. Pauker earned his medical degree at Harvard University in 1968 and trained in internal medicine and cardiology at Boston City and Massachusetts General Hospitals and the New England Medical Center, all in Boston. Dr. Pauker is a member of the Institute of Medicine.

Linda A. Randolph, M.D., MPH

Linda A. Randolph currently serves as President and CEO of the D.C. Developing Families Center, an innovative, comprehensive, one-stop center for childbearing and childrearing families in northeast Washington. She has spent her career working to make things happen at the community level that promote the health and well-being of mothers, children, and families and working to make changes in public policy. She has worked in public health at the federal, state, and local government levels and in academia. She is a graduate of the Howard University College of Medicine and the University of California's School of Public Health at Berkeley. Her experience includes completing a pediatrics residency in Harlem; serving as the national director of health services for the Federal Head Start program; directing the New York State Department of Health's Office of Public Health; serving as executive director of the Carnegie Corporation of New York’s “Starting Points” initiative and as executive director of the National Women’s Resource Center for Substance Abuse and Mental Illness. Dr. Randolph served as Clinical Professor of Community Medicine, Pediatrics and Psychiatry at the Mt. Sinai School of Medicine in NY and is currently adjunct research professor and senior health advisor at Georgetown University's Graduate Public Policy Institute.
Dr. Randolph was the 2001 recipient of the Martha May Eliot Award of the American Public Health Association, which honors exceptional achievements in the field of maternal and child health. She was recently appointed to the board of directors of Children’s Futures, a multi-million dollar Robert Wood Johnson-funded citywide initiative in Trenton, NJ focusing on the healthy growth and development of children birth to age three. She is a member of the national advisory committee to the Community Health Scholars Program, a post-doctoral fellowship program funded by the W. K. Kellogg Foundation to meet the growing needs of schools of public health and other health professions for faculty with community competency.

Brian Schulman, M.D.

Brian Schulman is a Diplomate of the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology in Psychiatry and a Certified Independent Medical Examiners, practices occupational and organizational psychiatry in Bethesda, Maryland. He specializes in the assessment of mental disorders and the determination of disability. Dr. Schulman has performed independent medical examinations for 25 years. He has authored numerous articles and textbook chapters on assessing the medical aspects of stress, psychiatric impairment, and the determination of disability. Additionally, he coauthored a book on the self-management of chronic pain. He is on the editorial board of the Journal of Occupational Rehabilitation and has lectured extensively to various health professional on such topics as the assessment of mental disability. His past experience includes service as a Lieutenant Commander in the United States Navy Medical Corps, Assistant Professor of Psychiatry at The Georgetown University School of Medicine, and Medical Consultant to the Institute of Human Resources, an employee assistance program developer.

Peter W. Thomas, J.D.

Peter W. Thomas is a principal at the law firm of Powers Pyles Sutter & Verville, P.C. He specializes in health care, rehabilitation and disability law and policy. He chaired the Subcommittee on Consumer Rights, Protections, and Responsibilities of the President’s Advisory Commission on Consumer Protection and Quality in the Health Care Industry. He has also served on advisory boards to two federal agencies, the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) and the NIH’s National Center for Medical Rehabilitation Research (NCMRR). He currently serves on the Boards of Directors of the Center for International Rehabilitation, the Center on Disability and Health, and is co-chair of the Health Task Force of the Consortium for Citizens with Disabilities. He previously served on the Board of Directors for the Commission on Accreditation for Rehabilitation Facilities from 2002-2004. He is the co-author of The Americans with Disabilities Act: A Guidebook for Management and People with Disabilities and is admitted to practice law in New York State and Washington, DC. He attended Boston College and Georgetown University Law Center where he was associate editor of the Journal of Law and Technology.

Craig A. Velozo, Ph.D., OTR/L

Craig A. Velozo is Associate Professor and Associate Chair of the Department of Occupational Therapy, College of Public Health and Health Professions, University of Florida. His research focus is on the development of outcome measures, using Rasch measurement theory.
Dr. Velozo has served as the Principal Investigator on a NIDRR field-initiated grant to develop a computerized adaptive measurement system for the Activity Dimension of the International Classification of Functioning Disability and Health. He also serves as Research Health Scientist and Co-Director of the Outcomes Measurement Focus of the Rehabilitation Outcomes Research Center located at the North Florida/South Georgia Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Gainesville, Florida. In 2000, Dr. Velozo received the highest research recognition in the profession, selection to the American Occupational Therapy Academy of Research.