Governing Board
Our independent Board guides HCCI towards its mission

Kathe Fox, PhD, Board Chair

Kathe Fox is an independent consultant and an adjunct faculty member of the Department of Biomedical Informatics at the Harvard Medical School. Most recently she was Vice President of Informatics at Aetna. Kathe also helped manage data governance for external release of Aetna data for research. Prior to joining Aetna, Kathe was Vice President and Practice Leader for Health Plan customers at Medstat (now Truven Health Analytics) where she was responsible for analytic and consulting solutions for the managed care market. In addition, Kathe was a Principal Investigator for contracts with CMS and AHRQ and was a member of the original team that vetted the Health Plan Report Card (1994) for NCQA.

Kathe holds a Ph.D. from Yale University (Department of Epidemiology and Public Health) and a B.A. in History from Skidmore College. She is President of the Alumni Board of the Yale School of Public Health, a member of the Scientific Advisory Board of axialhealthcare, and an advisor to Springboard Enterprises.

Carmella Bocchino, RN, MBA

Carmella Bocchino, a registered professional nurse and former hospital administrator, is President and CEO of CRB Strategies, LLC, a consulting organization offering strategic operation and policy services to health care organizations. Most recently, she served as Senior Advisor to the executive team at America’s Health Insurance Plans, AHIP.  Prior to her role as Senior Advisor, Ms. Bocchino held the position of Executive Vice President for Clinical Affairs and Strategic Planning at AHIP.  She currently serves on the Institute for Clinical and Economic Review (ICER) governance board. For the past two decades she has worked with the executives of health insurers developing strategies to streamline health plan operations, reform care delivery and payment model, and advance an interconnected health care system. Ms. Bocchino has a master’s degree in business administration from Rutgers University, an undergraduate degree in human resources management from Upsala College and a nursing degree from Mountainside Hospital School of Nursing. 

Michael E. Chernew, PhD

Dr. Chernew is the Leonard D. Schaeffer Professor of Health Policy and director of the Healthcare Markets and Regulation Lab in the Department of Health Care Policy at Harvard Medical School. Chernew’s research centers on examining health care payment models to reduce health care spending growth, focusing specifically on value-based insurance design, as well as the evaluation of population-based and episode-based payment models. Chernew is a member of the Congressional Budget Office’s Panel of Health Advisors and of the National Academy of Medicine’s Committee on National Statistics (CNSTAT). Dr. Chernew is the former Vice Chair of the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission (MedPAC), which is an independent agency established to advise the U.S. Congress on issues affecting the Medicare program. He has won several research awards and edits 2 peer review journals.

Aneesh Chopra, MPP

Aneesh Chopra is the President of CareJourney, a Hunch Analytics company that provides actionable, clinically-relevant analytics services to population health organizations. He served as the first U.S. Chief Technology Officer under President Obama (’09-’12) and in 2014, authored, "Innovative State: How New Technologies can Transform Government.” He joined the Board of the Health Care Cost Institute in 2017, earned his MPP from Harvard Kennedy School and BA from The Johns Hopkins University.

Lesley Curtis, PhD

Lesley H. Curtis is Professor and Chair of the Department of Population Health Sciences in the Duke School of Medicine.

A health services researcher by training, Dr. Curtis is an expert in the use of Medicare claims data for health services and clinical outcomes research, and a leader in national data quality efforts. Dr. Curtis serves as co-PI of the FDA’s Sentinel Innovation Center, Co-Investigator of the Data Core for the FDA’s Sentinel Initiative to monitor the safety of FDA-regulated medical products, and Chair of the Data Quality Subcommittee for the National Evaluation System for health Technology (NEST) Coordinating Center that generates real-world evidence for health technology and medical devices.

She serves as co-Investigator of the coordinating center for PCORI’s National Clinical Research Network (PCORnet), working with health systems and patient networks to develop a harmonized network infrastructure that leverages health systems and electronic health record data for robust observational and interventional research.

Ronke Ekwensi, MBA, MJ

Ronke Ekwensi is Vice President, Data Management for Prudential Financial’s U.S. Customer Office. With more than 25 years’ experience in data and information governance, Ms. Ekwensi is skilled in data strategy and privacy, as well as electronic discovery. She excels at building data management organizations and managing complex projects and initiatives. Before joining Prudential, Ms. Ekwensi served in various senior data and information governance capacities with several industry-leading firms, including Aetna, Baxalta and Pfizer. Her professional experience includes positions in the health care, biopharmaceuticals, power, technology, consumer electronics and management consulting industries.

Ms. Ekwensi earned a Bachelor’s degree in Psychology/Philosophy from D’Youville College in Buffalo, NY; an MBA in Global Management from the University of Phoenix; and a Masters of Jurisprudence in Health Law from the Loyola University Chicago School of Law.

A member of the Board of Advisors of the Cardozo Law School Data Law Initiative at Yeshiva University, Ms. Ekwensi is also Executive Director of HealthCore, Nig LTD, and organization dedicated to addressing health issues in Nigeria and sub-Saharan Africa through preventative health education and patient awareness.

Roy Goldman, PhD, FSA, MAAA, CERA

Roy Goldman is a retired actuarial executive who has been active in all areas of health insurance since 1980. His last position was Chief Actuary of Humana. Prior to that he was the CFO and Chief Actuary of Geisinger Health Plan in Danville, PA; Mercy Health Plans in St. Louis, MO; and The Prudential Insurance Company’s Group Operations.

Roy was the 72^nd President of the Society of Actuaries.  He is currently immediate Past President and a member of the board of directors. He served five years as a trustee of The Actuarial Foundation and was the founding sponsor of The Modeling the Future Challenge for high school students. He served six years on the Health Advisory Panel of the Congressional Budget Office. While at Humana, Roy help establish the Health Care Cost Institute.

He earned a Ph.D. in mathematics from Rutgers University and B.A., Phi Beta Kappa, Cum Laude from Franklin and Marshall College.  He is a Fellow of the Society of Actuaries [FSA] a member of the American Academy of Actuaries [MAAA], and a Chartered Enterprise Risk Analyst [CERA]. His research and articles have been published in the SOA’s Transactions, The American Journal of Managed Care, The Wharton Healthcare Quarterly, the SOA’s textbook on Group Insurance, and SOA’s Health Section’s Health Watch, and the Academy’s Contingencies.

Cara V. James, PhD

Cara James is President and CEO at Grantmakers In Health (GIH). Prior to joining GIH, she served as Director of the Office of Minority Health at the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) where she provided leadership, vision, and direction to advance the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and CMS goals related to reducing disparities and achieving health equity for vulnerable populations, including racial and ethnic populations, persons with disabilities, sexual and gender minorities, and persons living in rural communities. Under her guidance, CMS developed its first CMS Equity Plan to Improve Quality in Medicare, its first Rural Health Strategy, created an ongoing initiative to help individuals understand their coverage and connect to care, increased the collection and reporting of demographic data, and developed numerous resources to help stakeholders in their efforts to reduce disparities. Before joining CMS, Dr. James served as Director of the Disparities Policy Project and Director of the Barbara Jordan Health Policy Scholars Program at the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation, where she was responsible for addressing a broad array of health and access to care issues for people of color and other underserved populations, including the potential impact of the Affordable Care Act, analyses of state-level disparities in health and access to care, and disparities in access to care among individuals living in health professional shortage areas. Prior to joining the foundation, she worked at Harvard University and The Picker Institute.

Dr. James is a past member of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine’s Health and Medicine (NASEM) Roundtable on the Promotion of Health Equity and has served on several NASEM committees. She has published a number of peer-reviewed articles. Dr. James holds her doctorate in health policy and her bachelor’s degree in psychology from Harvard University.

Mara McDermott, JD, MPH

Mara McDermott is a Vice President at McDermott+Consulting. She is an accomplished health care executive with a deep understanding of federal health care law and policy, including delivery system reform, physician payment and Medicare payment models. Most recently Mara served as the senior vice president of federal affairs at America’s Physician Groups (formerly the California Association of Physician Groups, CAPG), a professional association representing medical groups and independent practice associations practicing in capitated, coordinated care models. As head of the Washington, DC, office, Mara worked on behalf of the association’s member organizations to advance policies that promoted coordinated care, including working with members of Congress and their staffs, the administration, health policy stakeholders and coalitions to advance alternative payment models. Mara’s work covered a wide variety of issue areas, including implementation of the Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act (MACRA) and Medicare Advantage policy, as well as issues related to the Medicare physician fee schedule and Medicare accountable care organizations. Previously, Mara was counsel in the health industry practice at a law firm in Washington, DC. In that role, she focused on a variety of issues affecting health industry clients, with a particular emphasis on health policy and regulatory issues facing physician organizations, hospitals, pharmaceutical companies and academic medical institutions.

Kyu Rhee, MD, MPP

Dr. Rhee is the Senior Vice President and Chief Medical Officer of Aetna where he oversees all clinical capabilities with a focus on enhancing the quality. He leads the innovative design and implementation of new integrated health care management strategies and population health solutions. Prior to CVS Health, Dr. Rhee was Vice President and Chief Health Officer at IBM where he was lead physician, public health and clinical executive leader for the global workforce of over 350,000 in 170 countries and was responsible for IBM’s efforts to transform health through data, analytics, artificial intelligence, and services for hospitals, health systems, providers, health plans, employers, governments, and life science companies. Earlier in his career, Dr. Rhee was Chief Public Health Officer at HRSA and Director of Innovation at NIH. He also worked as a National Health Services Corps primary care physician and Chief Medical Officer in Washington, D.C., and Baltimore and taught at GW University. Dr. Rhee earned his dual medical residency training in internal medicine and pediatrics from Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, his medical degree from the Keck School of Medicine at USC, a master’s degree in Healthcare Policy from Harvard University, and a BS in Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry from Yale University.

Kosali Simon, PhD

Dr. Kosali Simon is a nationally known health economist who specializes in applying economic analysis in the context of health insurance and health care policy. She is the Herman B Wells Endowed Professor and Associate Vice Provost for Health Sciences at Indiana University. Her current research mainly focuses on the impact of health insurance reform on health care and labor market outcomes, and on the causes and consequences of the opioid crisis.

Dr. Simon is a research associate of NBER, serves as a member of the governing body of the Association for Public Policy Analysis and management. She previously served on the board of ASHEcon, the board of the AEA's Committee on the Status of Women in Economics, and the National Advisory Committee of RWJF Health Policy Scholars Program.

She is Editor for the Journal of Health Economics, Co-Editor of Journal of Human Resources and editorial board member for the American Journal of Health Economics and the Journal of Policy Analysis and Management. She is former Associate Editor of Health Economics (2009-2018) and former co-editor of Journal of Policy Analysis and Management (2010-2015).

Robert J. Town, PhD

Dr. Town is the James L. and Nancy Powell Centennial Professor in American Economic Principles in the Department of Economics at the University of Texas-Austin. Dr. Town is an expert in health economics, industrial organization, and applied econometrics/data science. His research primarily focuses on the intersection of government policy as well as provider and insurer competition in the health care marketplace. He is on the Board of Editors at the American Economics Journal: Economic Policy.

Marshall Votta

Marshall draws from experience in technology, policy and communications to design, introduce and implement new ideas, and serves as an Operating Advisor at Nautic Partners, a private equity firm. Marshall has 20 years of experience developing early stage companies, especially in healthcare, focused on administrative, clinical and financial solutions that transform the relationships between health plans and providers. He has managed strategy and growth for RowdMap (exit to Cotiviti) and NaviNet (exit to Lumeris), and has successfully advised and implemented services for many of the top 50 U.S. payers. He previously worked in government and politics at state and federal levels, and currently participates in board and committee activities for various healthcare industry and local organizations. He completed the Liberal Arts Honors program at Providence College (BA/English) and was trained through the MIT Sloan Greater Boston Executive Program. He's an aspiring gardener, squash player, surfer, sailor... and any other outdoor activity favored by his wife and children.