Steven Garfinkel

Steven Garfinkel has 40 years’ experience in health services research, with a particular focus on health insurance, including Medicare, Medicaid, and private health insurance; health care outcomes and quality, especially the development of measures and the evaluation of their impact; and health care organization. As an AIR Institute Fellow, he is a member of the Health and Social Development Program's strategic leadership team and conducts special projects for the Program and for AIR’s Corporate Leadership.

Dr. Garfinkel joined AIR in 2001 following 27 years at RTI International. In his area of technical expertise, Health Policy and Research, he leads large, complex research projects; advises staff on research design, analysis, and project management issues; contributes to the development and implementation of business and staff development strategies; leads complex contract proposals and grant applications; and manages senior staff. As project director, principal investigator (PI), or analyst, he designs and conducts research, and manages relationships with sponsors, subcontractors and stakeholders. His technical work includes the design and evaluation of financing, quality improvement, and health information technology demonstration programs; the design and implementation of surveys intended to address health policy issues and measure quality of care; the design and implementation of qualitative and quantitative studies of health care organization and communications; and the analysis of data derived from surveys, controlled experiments, medical records, and health insurance claims.

Since 1980, he has worked on over 20 delivery system and reimbursement redesign evaluations sponsored by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, and the California HealthCare Foundation. He is a member of AIR’s Institutional Review Board, a member of the Biomedical IRB at UNC from 2002-2013, and previously a chair of the IRB at RTI International. He is adjunct professor of Health Policy and Management at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and a member of the editorial board of Medical Care Research and Review.