WASHINGTON — President Obama plans to nominate Donald M. Berwick, MD, MPP, FRCP, to head the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, an administration official told CNN.
Berwick is an authority on health care quality and improvement, according to his biography. A clinical professor of pediatrics and health care policy at Harvard Medical School, Berwick is also president and CEO of the Cambridge, Mass.-based Institute for Healthcare Improvement, a not-for-profit organization that promotes the improvement of health care.
He has served as vice chair of the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force, a member of the board of trustees of the American Hospital Association and chair of the National Advisory Council of the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality.
An interview with Kaiser Health News in November described Berwick as "a big promoter of efforts to reduce hospital infections, revamp the Medicare payment system to produce better patient outcomes and make public information on hospitals and doctor performance."
If confirmed by the Senate, Berwick would be charged with carrying out a number of provisions in the nation's sweeping health reform overhaul, including an expansion of Medicaid to an additional 16 million people and cutting almost a half-trillion dollars from Medicare over the next 10 years.
"This is always a big job," Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley, the ranking Republican on the Senate Finance Committee, said in a statement, "but the administration of health care reform, which includes implementing the hundreds of billions of dollars in Medicare cuts and the biggest expansion of Medicaid in its history, will make it more challenging than ever. The Finance Committee vetting will need to explore the nominee's preparedness for the enormous challenges that face the agency."
Berwick's name had been floated in rumors surrounding CMS' vacant top spot earlier this year. The behemoth agency has been without a permanent administrator since Mark McClellan stepped down in October 2006.
