The Altos Group

Julie A. Kliger, MPA, BSN

Julie A. Kliger
Principal and CEO

Over the last 20 years Ms. Kliger has been very active as in the areas of health professional practice re-design, medical error reduction, improving sepsis care, systems’ improvement, quality improvement and provider professionalism. Currently Ms. Kliger works with several organizations including University of California at San Francisco (UCSF) Medical Center, UCSF’s Center for Health Professions, Stanford University Hospital, San Francisco General Hospital, Kaiser Permenente Medical Centers, among others, directing a portfolio of $12M focused on addressing practice redesign in health care. This work was nationally recognized for its unprecedented improvement results in medication administration re-design. In 2008 she founded the Regional Nurse Network, currently with over 3400 members.

Prior to branching out on her own, Ms. Kliger worked for the University of California Office of the President in the Division of Clinical Services Development as Associate Director of Quality. In this capacity, she worked with the Chief Medical and Nursing Officers, Quality Improvement Directors and other leaders at the five UC academic medical centers and seven affiliate hospitals throughout the state of California. Ms. Kliger led the charge to implement the first ever system-wide, web based error reporting program which is active across all 5 academic medical centers. Due to her work on this project, she was asked to be a member of the National Quality Forum’s task force on developing universal taxonomy standards for error reporting systems.

 Ms. Kliger completed her Masters in Public Administration at Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government. There she focused on patient safety and error reduction policies. She completed her Bachelor’s of Science in Nursing from Columbia University in New York City and completed her Bachelor’s of Arts from U.C. Berkeley. She has been an invited speaker at numerous national conferences including, Joint Commission, National Quality Forum, University Health Consortium (UHC), RAND Corp., Joint Commission, Stanford University, American College of Emergency Physicians (ACEP), BMJ’s International Conference.

Ms. Kliger is a published author and her articles can be found in the Joint Commissions’ Journal on Quality and Patient Safety, Journal of Nursing Administration (March, 2010), Archives of Internal Medicine (April, 2010) among other notable publications.

Edward O'Neil, PhD, MPA, FAAN

Edward O'Neil
Senior Advisor

Edward O'Neil is a Professor at the University of California, San Francisco. He also serves as the Director of the Center for the Health Professions, a research, advocacy and training institute which he created to assist health care professionals, health professions schools, care delivery organizations and public policy makers understand the challenges and opportunities of educating and managing a health care workforce capable of improving the health and well being of people and their communities.

Dr. O'Neil served as the Executive Director of the Pew Health Professions Commission from 1989 through 1999; the Commission was a nationally recognized advocacy group focused on reform in health workforce issues. He has published numerous articles, chapters and books on his two principle areas of work: health care and leadership development. He is or has served as a consultant to the World Health Organization, Government of New Zealand, The Director’s office of the National Institute of Health, the Genentech Corporation, Rockefeller Foundation, Pew Charitable Trusts, W.K. Kellogg Foundation, Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, California HealthCare Foundation, Blue Shield Foundation of California as well as a number of federal, state and institutional agencies.

He holds Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees from the University of Alabama and a Master’s of Public Administration and Doctorate in History from Syracuse University. In addition he has received honorary degrees from New York Medical College, the Western University of Health Sciences and two other Universities. In 2003 he was elected to an honorary Fellowship in the American Academy of Nursing.

Alyson Falwell, MPH

Alyson Falwell
Director of Operations

Alyson Falwell joined The Altos Group in January, 2009. Previously she was manager of the Patient Safety Consortium, a collaborative of more than 120 hospitals working together under a Stanford University-based AHRQ-funded grant to measure and improve hospital safety culture. Based out of the Center for Health Policy/Primary Care and Outcomes Research at Stanford, Ms. Falwell managed several projects relating to patient safety, safety culture and the use of medical simulation. Prior to that she worked with the University of Washington's End-of-Life Care Research Program on projects aimed at improving palliative care in the ICU and improving physician and patient communication around end-of-life issues. From 2000 to 2002, she worked with the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Pennsylvania on clinical and public health research projects.

Ms. Falwell received a BA in psychology and political science from Skidmore College, and a Master of Public Health degree in health and policy research from the University of Washington. In 2004 she received the American Public Health Association's Master's Student Research Award. Her research interests include the utilization of healthcare services among caregivers of patients with Alzheimer's disease, and how psychosocial factors influence the use of health services. She is active in several San Francisco area organizations that work on issues of hunger and food insecurity, including Share Our Strength, Second Harvest Food Bank, and Glide.

Robert Duffy, MPA

Robert Duffy
Director of Strategy & Development

Bob Duffy has devoted his career to developing and implementing strategies that impact key issues in the public service sector. Bob is known nationally for his political acumen, particularly regarding his work on key local, state, and national campaigns and issues. His passion is now focused on making the world a better place through reducing healthcare costs and improving quality. He produces the Massachusetts Teachers Association's (MTA) TV & Radio advertising and earned media campaigns, creates public affairs and cause marketing programs, and provides crisis communications and public relations assistance to MTA locals throughout Massachusetts. Bob created and serves as President of an award winning 501c3 foundation, Reading Matters Inc, which uses cause marketing to promote student achievement in Massachusetts.

Bob has consulted for former U.S. Senator Edward Kennedy, U.S. Sen. John Kerry and numerous candidates and political causes including the President's Summit for America's Future, and other groups that promote volunteerism and public service. As a White House Advance person for the Clinton Gore Administration and the Clinton Gore election committees, he helped organize the 1996 Inauguration and worked on over 75 White House events involving President and Hillary Clinton, Vice President and Tipper Gore and various cabinet secretaries. He represented the White House in planning and conducting high profile diplomatic visits to Bosnia and Egypt. He also has covered politics and government as a print, television, and radio journalist at BusinessWeek Magazine, The Boston Globe, The Boston Business Journal, WMEX Radio and several local television stations in Massachusetts, Vermont, New Hampshire and Alaska.

Bob holds a B.S. in Journalism from Northeastern University and a Masters in Public Administration from Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government.

Thomas Huber, MS

Thomas Huber
Faculty

Thomas is a performance improvement advisor. His primary focus is on creating high performing front line teams that drive organizational performance. As an applied researcher and faculty member at Dartmouth Medical School he helped develop the microsystem model; a comprehensive approach to transforming organizations toward superior cost, quality, and service. Since 1996 he has worked with clients across the care continuum in more than 30 states. He has a MS degree from the Dartmouth Institute of Health Policy, and a BA in Philosophy and Psychology from Dartmouth College. He has taught training seminars at the Institute for Healthcare Improvement, and the Dartmouth Institute for Health Policy and Clinical Practice, and the American Hospital Association. Thomas lives in the Bay Area and enjoys kite surfing in the summer and skiing in the winter.

Joan Grebe, MA, OT

Joan Grebe
Faculty

Joan Grebe is an independent healthcare consultant specializing in educating others about quality improvement tools and techniques and facilitating quality improvement teams. She currently works with several national organizations to develop training series geared to strengthen systems at the strategic level and to develop technical support for improving the patient experience and the system’s clinical performance. In addition, Ms. Grebe is an Improvement Advisor for the Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI) Sepsis Collaborative. Previously, she was Improvement Advisor for the Improving Outcomes for High Risk and Clinically Ill Patients IMPACT Community of IHI and Assistant Director for IHI in the National Vascular Access Improvement Initiative “Fistula First” large spread project, conducted in conjunction with the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services and the End Stage Renal Disease Networks.

Joan received a Bachelor of Science and a Master of Arts degree from Tufts University, Boston School of Occupational Therapy. Her experience as an occupational therapist at both the staff and administrative levels includes acute inpatient, rehabilitation, home health, outpatient, and long-term care.

She is a certified Zenger-Miller trainer and is a member of the American Society for Quality, the American Society for Training and Development, and the American Association of Occupational Therapy. Joan is also trained in Appreciative Inquiry facilitation and the Lean approach to quality improvement.

Martin Luz, MA

Martin Luz
Faculty

Martin has been working in the field of public relations and strategic communications for 20 years. He brings extensive experience in a wide range of disciplines from message development, identity and branding, to media relations and internal communications. His diverse background as a practitioner includes work at PR agencies, in-house (managing corporate PR and communications programs), and as an independent consultant. Martin's industry specialties include insurance (life/health), asset management and banking, energy, management consulting and not-for-profit institutions. As a writer, he brings a specialty in thought leadership programs, having completed white papers and supporting collateral on a breadth of topics. He has written annual reports, identity and banding brochures, product collateral, websites — and entire range of marketing and communications materials. His ghost-written articles for clients have appeared in dozens of business publications in the U.S., Europe, and the Middle East. He holds a BA in Philosophy from Boston University and an MA in Creative Writing from The City University of New York.

Katherine Kim, MPH, MBA

Katherine Kim
Faculty

Kathy has spent over 20 years leading teams to innovate and excel in healthcare and technology enterprises such as Brown & Toland Medical Group, UCSF Medical Center, Brigham & Women's Hospital (Partners Health System), Alta Bates Medical Center (Sutter Health), and Oracle. She is also an entrepreneur: CEO of a venture-funded startup (one of only 2% of venture funded startups led by women nationally), leader of a business incubator, and Founder and President of Kim Consultants. Her consulting work focuses on strategic planning, leadership, and driving innovation with health information technology.

Kathy currently combines consulting with teaching and research as Professor in Residence of Biology and the Health Equity Institute for Research, Practice and Policy at San Francisco State University. Her research focuses on innovation and adoption in healthcare technology and service delivery, as well as the role of diversity and leadership. She has received awards from the American College of Healthcare Executives, UC Berkeley, American Association of University Women and others. Kathy is a published author of healthcare articles and papers and fiction. She earned an MPH and MBA from UC Berkeley, and a BA in Biology from Harvard College.