Pasadena, CA. – Today, the Kaiser Permanente School of Medicine announced its newest full-time faculty member in Health Systems Science. Quyen Ngo-Metzger, MD, MPH, will be a key contributor in curriculum development, teaching, and mentoring of students, as well as a collaborator in research and practice improvement at the medical school. Dr. Ngo-Metzger is the immediate past Scientific Director of the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force, which has developed and maintained over 130 clinical practice guidelines that form the scientific basis for preventive service coverage by private insurers and public providers nationwide.
“We are thrilled to welcome Quyen to the Kaiser Permanente School of Medicine,” Mark Schuster, MD, PhD, Founding Dean and Chief Executive Officer of the Kaiser Permanente School of Medicine said. “Her commitment to training more socially conscious physicians and her extensive experience with diverse patient populations have us excited about how much she will bring to our students and our school.”
Health Systems Science, one of the school’s major scientific disciplines, reflects recent advances in the practice and teaching of medicine. It explores how human relationships, and the networks of relationships that define systems, influence health. The curriculum will help students understand how to work with patients, families, interprofessional teams, and larger healthcare and social systems to improve health care quality and safety, increase the value of care provided, care for populations as well as individuals, and enhance health equity. Students will learn how to advocate for patients, partner with communities, and apply knowledge of economics, policy, and the socio-ecological determinants of health to help build environments that make health more possible.
“Health Systems Science requires a state-of-the-art understanding of what works, what doesn’t, and how to tell the difference; and it requires a deep awareness that high-quality health care is part of a complex social machine that creates health,” said Paul Chung, MD, MS, Chair of the Department of Health Systems Science. “That understanding and awareness is exactly what Quyen brings to this school.”
Dr. Ngo-Metzger brings over two decades of experience in studying and improving quality of care, health disparities, and evidence-based guidelines. Dr. Ngo-Metzger has been the recipient of the American Cancer Society Cancer Control Career Development Award for Primary Care Physicians as well as the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Secretary’s Meritorious Service Award.
As a researcher, Dr. Ngo-Metzger has published over eighty original peer-reviewed articles and been principal investigator or co-investigator on numerous grants from the National Institutes of Health, other federal agencies, and private foundations.
Dr. Ngo-Metzger completed her medical degree at the University of Chicago Pritzker School of Medicine in June 1992 and clinical internship and residency at the University of Chicago Department of Medicine in June 1995. She completed her fellowship in health services research and health policy at Harvard University in June 2000.
“I’m thrilled to have the opportunity to teach, learn from, and collaborate with some of the world’s brightest future doctors,” Dr. Ngo-Metzger said.
Kaiser Permanente School of Medicine is slated to open summer 2020. In February, the school announced that it had received preliminary accreditation from the Liaison Committee on Medical Education and began accepting applications from prospective students in May 2019 for admission.
