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In Memoriam Primary Care Advocate, Dr. Starfield Led Health Equality Efforts

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In Memoriam Primary Care Advocate, Dr. Starfield Led Health Equality Efforts Volume 32 • Number 8 August 2011 www.aapnews.org In Memoriam Primary care advocate, Dr. Starfield led health equality efforts A leading advocate of pri- “She inspired so many academic pediatricians mary care who developed child to look at the whole field of health services and assessment tools used daily by particularly health services for children,” said Mod- pediatricians, Barbara Starfield, ena H. Wilson, M.D., M.P.H., FAAP, who met M.D., M.P.H., FAAP, 78, of and worked with Dr. Starfield in 1979 at Johns Baltimore, died June 10 of an Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. apparent heart attack while “Her work has touched every pediatrician in prac- Dr. Starfield swimming at her home. tice in some way, whether he or she is aware of it Dr. Starfield led the development of the Child or not. She’s made a great contribution to the Health Illness Profile Primary Care Assessment improvement of health care for our nation and Tool. Her ideas formed the concept behind the also a great contribution to training researchers Johns Hopkins Adjusted Clinical Groups System, who will carry on her good work.” a measure of morbidity that improves accuracy Dr. Starfield earned her M.D. in 1959 from and fairness in evaluating provider performance, State University of New York, Downstate Medical identifying patients at high risk, forecasting health Center, completed her residency in pediatrics in care utilization and setting equitable payment rates. 1962 at Johns Hopkins Hospital’s Harriet Lane Chair (1988-’92) and member (1992-’94) of Home, followed in 1963 by an M.P.H. in epidemi- the AAP Council on Pediatric Research, her AAP ology at what was formerly named the Johns Hop- involvement also included serving as a member of kins University School of Hygiene and Public the Task Force on Preventive Child Health Care Health. Her career at Johns Hopkins spanned more (1978-’80) and the Steering Committee on Col- than 50 years. laborative Office-Based Research (1985-’95). She Dr. Starfield was past president of the Academic was an independent member on the AAP Center Pediatric Association (APA) (1980-’81) and first for Child Health Research (1999-2006) and served president and co-founder of the International Soci- on the Pediatrics editorial board (1978-’83). ety for Equity in Health (2000-’02). She also was At the time of her death, Dr. Starfield was dis- a member of the Institute of Medicine, Society for tinguished professor with appointments in the Pediatric Research and American Pediatric Society. Department of Health Policy and Management Her numerous honors included the APA Lifetime and Pediatrics at Johns Hopkins University Schools Achievement Award (2002) and Health and of Public Health and Medicine and director of the Human Services Special Recognition Award Johns Hopkins University Primary Care Policy (1991). Center. Dr. Starfield is survived by her husband, Neil An advocate for a reorganized U.S. health system Holtzman, M.D., four children and eight grand- with primary care as the core, she believed pedia- children. tricians should focus less on diseases and more on health and thinking socially. — Trisha Korioth ©Copyright 2011 AAP News.
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