About Us

The eHealth Institute is a private, charitable nonprofit organization (501 c 3) that seeks to harness the power of emerging technologies, especially the Internet, to improve health for all.

The Institute is unique in its focus on improving access to and quality of eHealth resources on a national and global level. As a new and nimble organization, it can be responsive to the rapid developments in information technology, and is not handcuffed by traditional approaches to problem solving.

We abide by the following principles:

visionary, innovative, and pioneering
evidence-based
independent and nonpartisan
proactive and responsive
collaborative
quality-, customer-, and performance-oriented

The Institute's Officers and the Board of Directors are recognized leaders in public health and medicine, technology, business, health and technology policy, and health communication in both the private and public sectors. They have written and spoken widely on health and technology issues, and have broad experience working on the community, state, national, and international levels.

Executive Leadership

Tom Eng, VMD, MPH, President

Board of Directors

David Gustafson, PhD, University of Wisconsin-Madison

Kevin Patrick, MD, MS, University of California, San Diego

Scott Ratzan, MD, MPA, MA, Johnson & Johnson, Journal of Health Communication

Jean Wooldridge, MPH, National Cancer Institute, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, and St. Cloud Communications

Biographies of Officers and Directors

Tom Eng, VMD, MPH, is President and founder of the eHealth Institute, EvaluMetrix LLC, and most recently, Healia, a health search engine company. Dr. Eng's areas of expertise include the application of emerging technologies, especially the Internet, to health communication, health care, public health, evaluation, and epidemiological research. He has led application development efforts, and has written and spoken extensively about eHealth development, quality, and policy. Dr. Eng's work in eHealth includes the landmark books, The eHealth Landscape, and Wired for Health and Well-Being. Dr. Eng has authored or co-authored more than 100 peer-reviewed articles, books and book chapters, and abstracts on a wide range of health and technology issues, which have appeared in JAMA, the American Journal of Preventive Medicine, and the British Medical Journal. He is an associate editor of the Journal of Health Communication and on the editorial board of Internet Healthcare Strategies and eHealth International. Dr. Eng has had an extensive public health career, including positions with the Institute of Medicine, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Peace Corps, Congressional Science Fellowship in the US Senate, and two state health departments. He is an alumnus of the University of Pennsylvania and Harvard University.

David H. Gustafson, PhD, MS, is Professor of Industrial Engineering and Preventive Medicine at the University of Wisconsin-Madison where he directs the development and evaluation of CHESS (the Comprehensive Health Enhancement Support System), a computer system to help people cope with breast cancer, AIDS/HIV, heart disease, Alzheimers disease, alcohol abuse, and sexual assault. He is a recognized expert in how demographic factors influence the use of interactive health communication technologies. Dr. Gustafson also has developed new methods and models to document consumer needs in quality improvement and to measure customer satisfaction, severity of illness, medical underservice, and quality of care. He serves as the chairperson of the US Department of Health and Human Services Science Panel for Interactive Communication and Health, and has served on numerous other national committees and task forces related to health, health care quality, and informatics. Dr. Gustafson is an author of four books and 100 papers in professional journals, proceedings, and books, and recently received the National Information Infrastructure Award of Merit. He received his MS and PhD from the University of Michigan.

Kevin Patrick, MD, MS, is Professor of Family and Preventive Medicine at the University of California, San Diego. He is Editor-in-Chief of the American Journal of Preventive Medicine, past president of the Association of Teachers of Preventive Medicine, and from 1989 to 1992 served on the Secretary's Council for Health Promotion and Disease Prevention of the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). He was Chief Medical Officer of HealthCentral.com. He currently serves as a member of the Armed Forces Epidemiological Board. From 1993 to 1995 Dr. Patrick was a Senior Advisor for Communication Technology Policy in the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Health of HHS. In this capacity he Co-chaired the National Information Infrastructure Task Force's Sub-Committee on Consumer Health Information and was instrumental in convening the HHS Science Panel on Interactive Communications and Health. Dr. Patrick has a background in both Preventive Medicine and Family Practice and is engaged in clinical practice, health services administration, teaching and research. He has been PI or Co-PI on more $15 million in public and private research and training grants and has authored over 90 scientific articles, book chapters, commentaries and abstracts on a broad range of topics including school, student and public health, infectious diseases, clinical counseling to improve behavioral health, communication technology, and consumer health information. He has served as a consultant to numerous organizations including Pacific Bell, the Hartford Foundation, Epitope, SmithKline Beecham Healthcare, Novartis, and the Institute for Alternative Futures.

Scott C. Ratzan, MD, MPA, MA, is Vice President, Government Affairs, Europe, Johnson & Johnson, and Editor-In-Chief of the Journal of Health Communication: International Perspectives. Dr. Ratzan's most recent position was as Senior Technical Adviser in the Bureau of Global Health at the United States Agency for International Development, (USAID), where he developed the global health communication strategy for U.S. funded efforts in 65 countries for the next decade. He also has served on expert committees for the World Health Organization (WHO), American Medical Association (AMA) and Institute of Medicine (IOM), as well as other U.S. government agencies. Following a decade in Boston (1988-1998) in academia as founder and Director of the Emerson-Tufts Program in Health Communication, a joint master's degree program between Emerson College and Tufts University School of Medicine, he moved to Washington focusing on health policy and communication. He continues to maintain faculty appointments at Yale University School of Medicine, Tufts University School of Medicine and George Washington University Medical Center as well as the College of Europe in Belgium. Dr. Ratzan's has appeared on Good Morning America and Nightline as well as published articles in the Wall Street Journal and Financial Times and in academic journals. His books include the Mad Cow Crisis: Health and the Public Good, Attaining Global Health: Challenges and Opportunities, and AIDS: Effective Health Communication for the 90s. He also has delivered many presentations including the Leiter lecture on Quality Health Communication for the National Library of Medicine and an address on risk communication for the National Cancer Institute that was selected in Vital Speeches of the Day. He received his MD from the University of Southern California; MPA from the John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University; and MA from Emerson College.

Jean A. Wooldridge, MPH, is Strategic Advisor for Cancer Communication Technologies, Office of the Director, Division of Cancer Control and Population Sciences, National Cancer Institute (NCI) in Bethesda, Maryland. She is based at the Cancer Prevention Research Program, Division of Public Health Sciences, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle, Washington. Her private company, St. Cloud Communications, leverages private/public partnerships in eHealth. Previously, she was Regional Program Director for the Pacific Cancer Information Service (PCIS) at the Hutchinson Center, as part of the national CIS network of the NCI. Program areas included an 800-call center (12,000 callers per year from 6 states), outreach to underserved populations (working with 500 regional agencies), and communications research (i.e., blue-collar smoking, breast and cervical cancer detection in underserved). Ms. Wooldridge led teams receiving federal contracts totaling over $21 million, and developed the first resource relational database in the CIS network in 1983. Her recent masters thesis at the University of Washington, was "Technology Features of a Public Health Internet Collaboratory: Acknowledging Stakeholder Diversity and Public/Private Roles in Complex Global Systems." Committee work for NCI and the US Department of Health and Human Services covers clinical trials, Web usability, public/private partnerships, Healthy People 2010, and academic/commercial technology futurist conferences. Interests: private/public partnerships, decision support, simulation, agents, and graphic interfaces for complex data.

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