Dr. Needleman is Research Professor and former Chair of the Department of Health Policy and Management at UCLA’s Fielding School of Public Health. He has taught health policy courses in the master’s programs and research design and statistical methods to doctoral and MS students. Additionally, Dr. Needleman serves on CHBRP’s cost team. Previously, he taught courses related to program and policy evaluation and health politics.

Dr. Needleman’s research focuses on how changing markets and public policy affect quality and access to health care, and how providers and insurers respond to regulatory and market incentives. Dr. Needleman’s publications on quality of care and nurse staffing are designated patient safety classics by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, and AHRQ, Medicare, Joint Commission, and National Quality Forum have adopted the quality measures he developed. Additionally, his research on how nurse staffing impacts patient outcomes received the first AcademyHealth Health Services Research Impact Award. Other research and policy projects have addressed issues of hospital and physician payment and health insurance reform. He is an elected member of National Academy of Medicine and an honorary Fellow of the American Academy of Nursing.

Dr. Needleman received his PhD in Public Policy from Harvard University. Prior to working at UCLA in 2003, he was Vice President and Co-Director of Lewin/ICF’s Public Policy Practice, a health policy research and consulting firm in Washington, and then he was on the faculty of the Harvard School of Public Health.