Speakers May 16, 2009

Alicia Cole
Actress, Advocate, Author

Alicia Cole has appeared in numerous television shows, she has worked as a production coordinator for Tricom Film and Video Productions and she is the founder and president of The Actor's Resource, an educational networking organization.

Ms. Cole is the survivor of a near-fatal healthcare-associated infection, which has led her to form the non-profit group Alliance for Safety Awareness for Patients (ASAP). ASAP works to educate and protect patients through awareness of hospital-acquired infections.

Alicia worked to help pass California's new infection reporting law and has recently been appointed to Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's Advisory Committee on Hospital-Associated Infections, which was created by Senate Bill 739.

Alicia is a graduate of The Ohio State University. Alicia's website

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Dr. Durbin is a primary physician a and Regional Medical Director in the Managed Care Department at the Palo Alto Medical Foundation She chairs the Diabetes Task Force and is involved in various quality of care initiatives at PAMF and across Santa Clara County. She is on the board of the Opportunity Health Clinic which serves the homeless. She is married, with three teenage sons. One of her twin sons had cancer as a toddler. Dr Durbin has written various articles and gives lectures on primary care, health maintenance, and the impact of cancer and its treatment on families.

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Dr. Julia Hallisy began to research the topic of patient safety in earnest in 1998 after her late daughter, Katherine Eileen, almost died from a hospital-acquired infection. Kate was diagnosed in 1989 at five months of age with the cancer bilateral retinoblastoma, which marked the beginning of a 20-year involvement in our healthcare system. In 2008, Dr. Hallisy published her book “The Empowered Patient: Hundreds of life-saving facts, action steps and strategies you need to know” and her personal goals include working diligently to help give patients a voice in healthcare quality and safety.

Dr. Hallisy obtained her BS in Biological Science from the University of San Francisco and a second bachelor’s degree from the University of California in Dental Sciences. In 1988, Dr Hallisy received her Doctorate in Dental Surgery from the University of California at San Francisco School of Dentistry.

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Dr. Peter Heseltine

Dr. Peter Heseltine is an expert on infectious diseases, microbiology, virology and the management of clinical laboratories. He has written 95 peer-reviewed publications and spoken across the world on issues related to infectious disease, bio-terrorism, and infection control. He currently serves as the Vice President and Medical Director for Breckman Coulter and was previously the Medical Director for infectious disease for Quest Diagnostics. He has also worked at the CDC in Applied Epidemiology and has served on numerous boards and tasks forces regarding HIV/AIDS managed care and associated clinics. He has also served as Clinical Professor of Medicine at the University of California, Irvine and the University of Southern California. He completed his undergraduate and medical degree at Trinity College, Dublin University in Ireland.

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Ronald Hoffman, M.D.
Specialist in Neurology
Dr. Hoffman is a neurologist who received his undergraduate, medical school and residency training at Stanford University from 1963 until 1976. Following his neurology residency, Dr. Hoffman became a Clinical Assistant Professor of Neurology at Stanford Hospital and established his practice as a community neurologist in the El Camino Hospital district. Dr. Hoffman has served as chairman of the Quality Assurance Committee of the Sunnyvale Medical Clinic and chairman of the Medical Ethics Committee at El Camino Hospital. Last year he received an award from the state legislature of California for outstanding medical care. Dr. Hoffman considers his chief professional accomplishment to be 3 1/2 decades of dedicated service to the diagnosis, care, and treatment of his many patients over the years.

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Roger Holzberg
Roger became a thyroid cancer survivor almost 5 years ago, but he began learning about health challenges long before then. He became familiar with care-giving at an early age, losing grandparents, a best friend, and his mother along the way and watching his father become a cancer survivor. He knew it was likely he would someday face a life-threatening challenge himself. Friends and family wondered at his substance free, party lean, active and health-focused lifestyle, as did he, until he was diagnosed on the eve of his 50th birthday. "At that moment I knew why I had lived the lifestyle I had, because that lifestyle not only gave me the mental and physical conditioning needed to face my heath challenge, but knowing my body in health as well as I did gave me the means to know when something subtle was wrong. And early detection is a huge benefit." A year after radiation, as a competitive triathlete raising money for those less fortunate, he learned that the only way to complete a race that is too big to imagine is to break it down into imaginable pieces, set small goals along the way with the help of your Team's experience and guidance, and take the first step. This family history and approach to challenges became the foundation of My Bridge 4 Life. Professionally, Roger creates world-class experiences that utilize new technology channels for the delivery of emotionally compelling narrative and retail products. Recent clients include: Lucas Arts, Keas, Livestrong, Methuselah Foundation, and Tula Health. He previously spent 12 years as a Creative Director / Vice President at the Walt Disney Company, first at Disney Interactive and then at Imagineering. Before Disney, Roger helped build Knowledge Adventure, creator of the Jumpstart brand, and was a creative leader in interactive projects like Steven Spielberg's Director's Chair and Starbrite Worlds Online. In "classic media" he has written and directed feature films and television, but is genuinely proud of researching/writing "The Living Sea" (Academy Award nomination for best documentary-Imax).

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Missy Krasner
Product Marketing Manager,
Google Health
Ms. Krasner has over fifteen years of healthcare policy and healthcare marketing and communications experience. She has worked in both the non-profit and corporate sectors where her experience has ranged from coordinating high-level press briefings on Capitol Hill to launching health information technology products for Fortune 100 companies and IPO offerings. Ms. Krasner is currently working as the lead Product Marketing Manager at Google Health, a new product that helps users organize, manage and share they medical records online. Prior to coming to Google, Ms. Krasner worked in the Secretary's Office at the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services' (HHS) as Senior Advisor to Dr. David Brailer, M.D.,Ph.D., the first National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC). Before coming to HHS, Ms. Krasner worked as Marketing Director for CareScience, Inc., a "private-to-public" healthcare technology company that sold Internet-based tools and consulting services to hospitals, integrated delivery health systems, and pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies. Prior to her role at CareScience, Ms. Krasner helped lead Press and Communications at the Kaiser Family Foundation, a non-partisan, national, healthcare policy think tank. Ms. Krasner also worked at Aetna Inc. where spearheaded a national provider relations campaign to Aetna's contracted providers. Ms. Krasner holds an M.A. in Communications and Healthcare Administration from Stanford University and a B.A. in English Literature from the University of California, Los Angeles. She has published a series of articles.

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Dr. Susan Meehan
Ph.D., MFT, Licensed Therapist

Dr. Susan Meehan is a licensed marriage and family therapist based in the San Francisco Bay Area. She maintains a private practice in Menlo Park that specializes in health related challenges for individuals and their families. Her practice is integrative, pulling from empirically-validated therapies (including Cognitive Behavioral Therapy-CBT, Dialectical Behavioral Therapy-DBT, and Mindfulness/Acceptance Therapy) with more traditional insight-oriented and supportive approaches.Her primary goal with all clients is to facilitate adjustment and empower a healthy, flexible and adaptive relationship with life-altering challenges, including chronic illness. In addition to her private practice, Dr. Meehan is a staff therapist at Family and Children's Services of Palo Alto, a non profit agency for underserved children, youth and adults and at San Mateo Medical center's Edison Clinic, providing comprehensive mental health and counseling services for individuals and families affected by HIV/AIDS in San Mateo County. Dr. Meehan received her doctorate from Stanford University and masters in clinical counseling psychology from Notre Dame deNamur University. A former visiting lecture in Developmental Psychology in both the United States and Australia, she is licensed as a Marriage and Family Therapist by the Board of Behavioral Sciences in the State of California.

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Darren Phelan, M.D.
The Total Care Practice

Dr. Phelan has been practicing medicine for over 14 years. His Emergency Medicine experience has given him tremendous exposure to all aspects of medicine and traumatic injuries. Dr. Phelan has combined this experience with his desire to provide compassionate, individualized medical care to the patients in his practice. Dr. Phelan's practice is the antithesis of what a regular medical practice is - with a limit of 300 patients in his practice, Dr. Phelan spends a lot of time with his patients in however they prefer to access the health system - by phone, email or in the office. Dr. Phelan's goal is to make medicine personal and to leave no stone unturned. Dr. Phelan completed his undergraduate and medical studies at Pepperdine and the University of California at San Francisco School of Medicine, and completed his residency at the University of California at Davis where he was the Chief Resident in Emergency Medicine. He has run the Total Care Practice in Menlo Park, Ca since 2004.

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Joanna Smith, LCSW, MPH
CEO, Healthcare Liaison, Inc

Joanna Smith is the founder and CEO of Healthcare Liaison, Inc. a private healthcare advocacy practice located in Berkeley CA. She founded Healthcare Liaison in 2005 after a 25-year career working in San Francisco Bay Area healthcare systems as a medical social worker and hospital discharge planner.

Smith is an active proponent for the advancement of private healthcare advocacy, and is a leader in the development of professional standards for practitioners. In 2007 Healthcare Liaison established the nation’s first accreditation program for private healthcare advocates. She received her undergraduate degree from the University of Vermont; a master’s degree in social work from Tulane University; and a master’s degree in public health (maternal and child health) from UC Berkeley. She is licensed as a clinical social worker by the State of California.

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Jay M. Tenenbaum, Ph.D.,
Chairman and Chief Scientist

Jay M. ("Marty") Tenenbaum is the founder and Chairman of CollabRx. Dr. Tenenbaum brings to CollabRx the unique perspective of a world-renowned Internet commerce pioneer and visionary. He was founder and CEO of Enterprise Integration Technologies, the first company to conduct a commercial Internet transaction (1992), secure Web transaction (1993) and Internet auction (1993). In 1994, he founded CommerceNet to accelerate business use of the Internet. In 1997, he co-founded Veo Systems, the company that pioneered the use of XML for automating business-to-business transactions. Dr. Tenenbaum joined Commerce One in January 1999, when it acquired Veo Systems. As Chief Scientist, he was instrumental in shaping the company's business and technology strategies for the Global Trading Web. Post Commerce One, Dr. Tenenbaum was an officer and director of Webify Solutions, which was sold to IBM in 2006, and Medstory, which was sold to Microsoft in 2007. Earlier in his career, Dr. Tenenbaum was a prominent AI researcher and led AI research groups at SRI International and Schlumberger Ltd. Dr. Tenenbaum is a fellow and former board member of the American Association for Artificial Intelligence, and a former consulting professor of Computer Science at Stanford. He currently serves as a director of Efficient Finance, Patients Like Me, and the Public Library of Science, and is a consulting professor of Information Technology at Carnegie Mellon's new West Coast campus. Dr. Tenenbaum holds B.S. and M.S. degrees in Electrical Engineering from MIT, and a Ph.D. from Stanford.

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Advisory Board

David J. Benefiel, M. D

John Biestman
Director, Federal Home Loan Bank

David Epstein
President,
Strategic Ally, Inc.

Helen Haskell
President,
Mothers Against Medical Errors

Terrel Hutton
Director,
Producer’s Circle, KQED

Missy Krasner
Product Marketing Manager
Google Health

Tom McCleary
Founder, GroupSwim

Susan Meehan
Ph.D., MFT
Licensed Therapist

Trisha Torrey
Patient Advocate
EveryPatientsAdvocate.com