Promoting Health and Wellness

NEHI research and analysis promotes the adoption of evidence-based policy and practices for health promotion, the prevention of chronic disease and reducing health risks such as obesity. Current NEHI projects focus on the unique social, political and business challenges of sustaining effective, multi-factor strategies that will improve health at the local and regional level, and enhance the positive determinants of health that research has shown exert a more decisive influence on patient health and medical spending than medical care itself.

Meet Our Experts

Valerie Fleishman Executive Director

Valerie Fleishman provides the strategic and operational direction for NEHI. As Executive Director, she oversees the institute’s policy research, programs, operations, fundraising and communications. Under her leadership, NEHI's programs seek to improve chronic illness care, promote disease prevention and wellness, and speed the adoption of valuable innovations across the health care system. She has authored numerous reports, articles and briefs on a wide range of health policy issues.

Ms. Fleishman joined NEHI at its founding in 2002. She has over fifteen years’ experience in health care, health policy, technology and innovation. Prior to joining NEHI, Ms. Fleishman was a director in Health and Wellness at Scient Corporation, where she led strategic consulting engagements with leading biotechnology, medical device and pharmaceutical clients in areas such as telemedicine, disease management, health information technology, clinical trials, and sales and marketing strategies.

Previously, Ms. Fleishman was a manager in Arthur D. Little's Global Strategy Practice. She also worked in product management and brand marketing at Johnson & Johnson's McNeil Consumer Products.

Ms. Fleishman received her bachelor of arts, cum laude, from Harvard University and her master of business administration from the Harvard Business School. In 2008, she was honored as one of Boston’s "40 under 40" by the Boston Business Journal.
Tom Hubbard Vice President of Policy Research

Tom Hubbard leads NEHI’s projects on comparative effectiveness research, patient medication adherence, and prevention and wellness initiatives. Mr. Hubbard leverages his policy and technology experience to examine ways the country’s health care system can be transformed, focusing on the promotion of medical innovation and the improvement of quality and efficiency in clinical care.

Mr. Hubbard came to NEHI after seven years at the Massachusetts Technology Collaborative (MTC), where he led industry-focused projects and supervised the annual publication of the MTC Index of the Massachusetts Innovation Economy. His work has included supervising the I-495 Technology Corridor Partnership, an industry-municipal collaboration on growth, and leading projects on broadband deployment, federal research funding advocacy, and nanotechnology.

Previously, Mr. Hubbard served as Executive Assistant for Economic Affairs to U.S. Senator John Kerry, as Deputy Director of Development for Massachusetts Governor Michael Dukakis, and as Director of Community Development and Planning for the City of Gardner, Massachusetts.

Mr. Hubbard graduated from Harvard College and holds a masters in public policy from Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government.
Susan Dentzer President and CEO

Susan Dentzer is the President and Chief Executive Officer of the NEHI, the Network for Excellence in Health Innovation, a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization composed of more than 100 stakeholder organizations from across all key sectors of health and health care. NEHI’s mission is to advance innovations that improve health, enhance the quality of health care, and achieve greater value for the money spent. With offices in Washington, DC, and Boston, Massachusetts, NEHI conducts independent, objective research and thought leadership to accelerate these innovations and bring about changes within health care and public policy.

One of the nation's most respected health and health policy thought leaders and journalists, and a frequent speaker and commentator on television and radio, including NPR, Dentzer previously served as senior policy adviser to the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. Prior to that, she was editor-in-chief of the journal Health Affairs, and from 1998 to 2008, she served as the on-air Health Correspondent for the PBS NewsHour.

Dentzer is an elected member of the National Academy of Medicine and the Council on Foreign Relations. She is a member of the Board of Directors of the International Rescue Committee, a leading humanitarian organization; a member of the board of directors of Research!America, which works to advance research to improve health; and a member of the board of directors of the Public Health Institute. She is a fellow of the National Academy of Social Insurance and the Hasting Center, an institution dedicated to bioethics and the public interest. She previously served as a public member of the American Board of Medical Specialties. She serves on multiple advisory boards, including those of the Duke-Margolis Center; the Philip R. Lee Institute for Health Policy Studies at the University of California-San Francisco; and the March of Dimes public policy advisory group.

A graduate of Dartmouth, Dentzer formerly chaired the Dartmouth Board of Trustees, and is a member of the Board of Advisors of Dartmouth Medical School. She and her husband, Charles Alston, have three grown children.

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Initiatives

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Themes Chronic Disease Health IT Telemedicine

Publication Date: July 17, 2009

FAST Detailed Technology Analysis - Home Telehealth

During 2008-2009, NEHI's Fast Adoption of Significant Technologies (FAST) initiative focused on telemedicine technologies that address chronic disease. Chronic disease is of particular concern because of the growing prevalence of illnesses such as diabetes and heart disease and the mounting costs these preventable conditions generate in the health care system. NEHI reviewed over 100 telemedicine technologies, identified the eleven considered most promising, and then examined in detail the two that were highest rated, Tele-stroke and Home Telehealth. NEHI completed Detailed Technology Analyses of each.
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Themes Health Behaviors Healthcare Spending

Publication Date: June 30, 2009

Healthy People in a Healthy Economy: A Blueprint for Action in Massachusetts

The Boston Paradox report, published in 2007 by NEHI and the Boston Foundation, demonstrated that Massachusetts has plenty of health care but not enough health. The economic recession has only put challenges related to unhealthy behaviors - and resulting chronic illness - into starker relief. Healthy People in a Healthy Economy offers a blueprint for action that will help connect the missing links between health, healthy behaviors and a healthy economy.
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Themes Health Reform Patient Engagement Waste

Publication Date: May 26, 2009

Remaking Primary Care: From Crisis to Opportunity

This report focuses on the factors contributing to the failure of our current primary care system and offers innovative approaches to reform its design and delivery.
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Themes Patient Engagement Technology Adoption Telemedicine

Publication Date: January 22, 2009

FAST Update: 2008-2009 Candidate Technologies

The FAST search for promising technologies initiated in 2008 was focused on identifying telemedicine technologies specifically used to treat chronic disease. The FAST team reviewed over 100 health care technologies in this area, narrowing them to the 11 most promising candidates detailed in this report.
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Themes Chronic Disease Health IT Telemedicine

Publication Date: January 21, 2009

Remote Physiological Monitoring: Research Update

Updated research on RPM technologies, emphasizing the cost effectiveness of RPM use compared to standard care and disease management practices, as well as remaining barriers to its adoption.
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Themes Chronic Disease Healthcare Spending Waste

Publication Date: July 29, 2008

The Wasteland of Health Care

This graphic displays the most significant areas of waste in health care as identified by NEHI's research in this area.
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Themes Health Behaviors Healthcare Spending

Publication Date: June 1, 2007

The Boston Paradox: Lots of Health Care, Not Enough Health

Health care resources are being devoted to treatment -- and not prevention -- of chronic disease, which is impacting economic competitiveness.
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Themes Evidence-based Medicine Patient Engagement

Publication Date: August 29, 2006

Challenges in Vaccine Policy: A Case Study of the HPV Vaccine

The HPV vaccine's immense promise in preventing cervical cancer -- and the barriers to its widespread adoption -- make it an ideal vehicle for implementing important improvements to the U.S. immunization system.
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Themes Chronic Disease Telemedicine

Publication Date: March 1, 2005

Continuous Glucose Monitoring: Innovation in the Management of Diabetes

CGM devices have potential to be highly valuable and cost-effective tools in managing diabetes.
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Themes Chronic Disease Health IT Telemedicine

Publication Date: July 1, 2004

Remote Physiological Monitoring: Innovation in the Management of Heart Failure

RPM provides substantial benefits to the health care system by reducing the number of hospital visits, length of stay and health care costs -- while improving quality of life -- for heart failure patients.
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NEHI'S Impact

In the Media

"'Anything that drives up costs has got to be a concern, and diabetes, which is still pretty much uncontrolled, is driving up those costs,” says [Healthy People/Healthy Economy Report Card] report author Tom Hubbard, a senior program director at NEHI.'"-WBUR CommonHealth Blog

On National Policy

On September 10, NEHI Executive Director Valerie Fleishman testified at the Massachusetts State House before the Joint Committee on Public Health at a hearing on House Bill 2634, An Act to Promote Healthy People and a Healthy Economy in Massachusetts, filed by Representative Kay Khan.