Comparative Effectiveness Research

Biography
Juesta Caddell, Ph.D., is a senior research clinical psychologist in RTI’s Health, Social, and Economics Research Unit. She has more than 20 years' experience in designing and conducting mental health, behavioral medicine, and substance abuse research. Dr. Caddell has been a direct service provider to psychiatric patients and behavioral medicine patients in both inpatient and outpatient settings. She has particular expertise in the areas of trauma-related psychiatric disorders, including post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and other anxiety disorders. Dr. Caddell is proficient in conducting and interpreting a variety of standardized psychological assessment instruments and in developing clinical research and survey instruments to assess psychiatric symptomatology and disorders. She has published writings on mental health and substance abuse, including journal articles and book chapters on PTSD. Dr. Caddell is the chair of one of the Institutional Review Board Committees for the Protection of Human Subjects at RTI. Read More…

Biography
Sheri Fehnel, PhD, is Global Head of Patient-Reported Outcomes in RTI Health Solutions. She specializes in the development and evaluation of questionnaires designed to measure health-related quality of life, patient satisfaction, resource utilization, and other patient-reported outcomes. Dr. Fehnel has moderated countless focus groups, conducted cognitive interviews patient and professional populations, and assessed potential sources of measurement error through cognitive forms appraisal. She has evaluated the psychometric properties of survey and clinical instruments using factor analysis, structural equations modeling, and item response theory. Read More…

Biography
Michael T. Halpern, MD, PhD, Senior Fellow in health services research, appointed August 2009, has more than 15 years of professional experience evaluating patterns of medical care, quality of care, clinical outcomes and cost-effectiveness, access, and disparities. His research includes evaluations of medical treatment patterns, resource utilization, and outcomes using large health care databases; modeling studies of medical care costs and cost-effectiveness; assessments of patient symptoms, satisfaction, and quality of life; appraisals of the impacts of health information technologies; and examinations of factors influencing decision making by physicians and patients. Before joining RTI, Dr. Halpern was strategic director of health service research at the American Cancer Society. He has more than 100 peer-reviewed publications and serves as an adjunct professor in the Department of Health Policy and Management at the Emory University Rollins School of Public Health and at the Georgetown University Public Policy Institute. Read More…

Biography

Kathleen N. Lohr, PhD, Distinguished Fellow (appointed June 2003) in health services research, has 35 years of experience in health services and policy research. She was the founding director of the RTI International–University of North Carolina Evidence-based Practice Center and the RTI DEcIDE Center, and is now senior advisor to both. Dr. Lohr is also the founding editor-in-chief of RTI Press. Before coming to RTI in 1996, Dr. Lohr spent nine years at the Institute of Medicine and 12 years at The RAND Corporation, leading work on quality of care, health insurance, and other health care topics. She has written or edited dozens of reports and more than 130 peer-reviewed articles. She served as associate editor of Quality of Life Research and participates on numerous national advisory committees, including the National Advisory Council for the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality. In 2005, she received ISPOR's Avedis Donabedian Outcomes Research Lifetime Achievement Award. In 2007, she received RTI's Margaret Elliott Knox Excellence Awards for contributions to research.

Biography
Heather Ringeisen, PhD, MS, BS, serves as a co-investigator on the National Survey of Child and Adolescent Well-Being II. She also serves as a senior research psychologist on NSCAW, the first national longitudinal study that examines child and family well-being and relates it to their experience with the child welfare system and community environment. Dr. Ringeisen is a children's mental health services researcher with a special interest in the non-specialty mental health service systems. Prior to her work at RTI, Dr. Ringeisen served as chief of the Child and Adolescent Services Research Program at NIMH, where she directed a research program that examined the quality, organization, and financing of services for children with mental disorders. Dr. Ringeisen has served on multiple federal committees established to coordinate activities related to children's mental health. She previously received the Society for Research in Child Development policy fellowship and is a licensed clinical child psychologist. Read More…