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National Leader in Child Health Policy Joins Cincinnati Children's

Monday, January 01, 0001

Lisa Simpson, MB, BCh, MPH, has been named director of the newly expanded Child Policy Research Center (CPRC) at Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center. Dr. Simpson, a pediatrician, is a nationally recognized child health policy researcher. She comes to Cincinnati Children's from All Children's Hospital in St. Petersburg, Florida, where she was Guild Endowed Chair in Child Health Policy and Professor of Pediatrics at the University of South Florida.

Founded in 1999, the CPRC is a community resource that provides information on child health issues in the region to policy makers, community leaders, child advocates and anyone interested in improving the well-being of children. Under Dr. Simpson's leadership, the CPRC will expand its activities to support the development and implementation of health policies that facilitate dramatic improvements in the quality of care for children throughout Ohio and the United States.

The CPRC will continue to provide evidence-based information and resources for programs and policymakers in the Cincinnati area and will:

• Build on its existing work in studying the health of children in the Cincinnati area and providing assistance to community-based programs to improve the quality and effectiveness of their services
• Undertake policy-relevant research to improve the design, development and implementation of child health policies and programs nationally work in partnership with other state and national policy organizations to focus attention on the needs of children and their families and how health care policies must respond to these unique needs.

"An expanded CPRC is a critical component of the Cincinnati Children's vision to be the leader in improving child health," says James Anderson, president and CEO. "We will not achieve the transformation in health care that we seek unless we have health policies that support optimal care. These include financing, payment, educational and programmatic policies. We are very fortunate to have Dr. Simpson helping us produce the research and information that policymakers need to improve care for children throughout the country."

Prior to joining Cincinnati Children's, Dr. Simpson established the Florida Initiative for Children's Healthcare Quality. She also had served as the deputy director at the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. During her tenure at this federal agency, she led numerous initiatives to improve research on quality and safety of care and to increase the amount of research focused on children. The agency not only grew in prominence but its budget doubled to more than $300 million.

Dr. Simpson brings to Cincinnati Children's a background combining pediatrics with additional training in public health and health services research and policy, as well as experience running state programs for mothers and children. She has received numerous awards, including the Excellence in Public Service Award from the American Academy of Pediatrics, the Senior Executive Service Meritorious Presidential Rank Award, and the Department of Health and Human Services Secretary's Distinguished Service Award. She serves on several national committees and was elected to the Boards of two national professional associations -- the Ambulatory Pediatric Association and AcademyHealth. She writes and speaks frequently about child health policy and is often called to give advice on policy initiatives.

"Cincinnati Children's s stands out as an institution that has effectively translated a commitment to better outcomes into measurable and substantial improvements for patients," says Dr. Simpson. "It only makes sense to now expand this commitment to understanding which policies can sustain or impede these improvements. Too often, children are left out of policy initiatives, which tend to focus on improving care for adults and the elderly, but kids are not little adults. They need unique solutions for their unique needs. The Child Policy Research Center will work to develop those solutions and bring them to policymakers."

"While we have already had phenomenal success with our improvement efforts, Dr. Simpson will lead our efforts to expand our impact to the policy arena," adds Uma Kotagal, MBBS, MSc, senior vice president for quality and transformation at Cincinnati Children's. "Nationally, when people talk about policy, quality and children, they think of Dr. Simpson. She is recognized for her ability to bring innovative thinking and research findings together to design solutions to policy problems."

Dr. Simpson succeeds Ed Donovan, MD, MPH, who founded and led the CPRC for the last eight years and will now focus on the CPRC's activities at the community and state levels. Dr. Donovan remains an active contributor to CPRC activities to improve child health in the Cincinnati area and will work closely with Dr. Simpson and other CPRC faculty.

Cincinnati Children's, one of the top five children's hospitals in the nation according to Child magazine, is a 475-bed institution devoted to bringing the world the joy of healthier kids. Cincinnati Children's is dedicated to providing care that is timely, efficient, effective, family-centered, equitable and safe. For its efforts to transform the way health care is provided, Cincinnati Children's received the 2006 American Hospital Association-McKesson Quest for Quality Prize". Cincinnati Children's ranks second nationally among all pediatric centers in research grants from the National Institutes of Health and is a teaching affiliate of the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine. The Cincinnati Children's vision is to be the leader in improving child health.