Dr. Gregory Simon appointed to Precision Medicine advisory panel

Group Health psychiatrist and researcher will advise on Initiative’s Cohort Program

SEATTLE—The National Institutes of Health (NIH) has appointed Gregory Simon, MD, MPH, as a member of the advisory panel for the President’s Precision Medicine Initiative’s Cohort Program. Dr. Simon is a Group Health psychiatrist, a senior investigator at Group Health Research Institute, and chair of the Depression and Bipolar Support Alliance’s Scientific Advisory Board.

“People living with mental health conditions have a wide range of treatment options, but we need better evidence to help them choose,” Dr. Simon said. “The Precision Medicine Initiative hopes to substitute science for what’s now decided by trial and error.”

Precision medicine

Precision medicine is a new approach to disease prevention and treatment that takes into account individual differences in people’s genes, environments, and lifestyles. The Precision Medicine Initiative aims to produce the scientific evidence needed to put this approach into clinical practice.

A key part of the Initiative is the creation of its Cohort Program. This first-of-its-kind national research collection will take one million or more volunteers from all walks of life. The goal is to build a resource that will help scientists answer a wide range of important health questions.

“The Program will expand our understanding of the ways we can improve health and treat disease,” said NIH Director Francis Collins, MD, PhD.

Advisory Panel

Panel members will provide ongoing guidance and oversight of the cohort, while contributing significantly to the evolution of the program's vision, scientific and clinical goals, and operations.  

In addition to Dr. Simon, the panel’s other members are:

• Lon Cardon, PhD, Senior Vice President, Alternative Discovery & Development, GlaxoSmithKline
• Alta Charo, JD, Warren P. Knowles Professor of Law and Bioethics, University of Wisconsin Law and School of Medicine & Public Health
• Tony Coles, MD, MPH, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Yumanity Therapeutics
• Sir Rory Collins, FRS, Professor of Medicine & Epidemiology and Head, Nuffield Department of Population Health, University of Oxford
• Eric Dishman, Intel Fellow & General Manager, Health & Life Sciences, Intel Corporation
• Alejandra Gepp, MA, Associate Director, National Council of La Raza, Institute of Hispanic Health
• Sachin Kheterpal, MD, MBA, Associate Professor, Department of Anesthesiology, University of Michigan Medical School
• Marie Lynn Miranda, PhD, Howard R. Hughes Provost and Professor of Statistics, Rice University, Adjunct Professor of Pediatrics at Duke University, University of Michigan, and Baylor College of Medicine
• Bray Patrick-Lake, MFS, Director of Stakeholder Engagement, Clinical Trials Transformation Initiative; Director of Patient Engagement, CTSA, Duke University
• Sharon Terry, MA, President and Chief Executive Officer, Genetic Alliance
• David Williams, MPH, Florence and Laura Norman Professor of Public Health; Professor of African and African American Studies and Sociology, Harvard University

Its ex officio members are:

• Rob Califf, MD, Deputy Commissioner for Medical Products and Tobacco, U.S. Food and Drug Administration
• Karen DeSalvo, MD, MPH, MSc, Acting Assistant Secretary for Health, National Coordinator for Health Information Technology, Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services
• Michael Gaziano, MD, MPH, Principal Investigator, Million Veterans Program; Chief, Division of Aging, Brigham and Women's Hospital; Profession of Medicine, Harvard Medical School

Additional members will be named over time.

National Institutes of Health

National Institutes of Health (NIH), the nation's medical research agency, includes 27 Institutes and Centers and is a component of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. NIH is the primary federal agency conducting and supporting basic, clinical, and translational medical research, and is investigating the causes, treatments, and cures for both common and rare diseases.

About Kaiser Permanente

Kaiser Permanente is committed to helping shape the future of health care. We are recognized as one of America’s leading health care providers and not-for-profit health plans. Founded in 1945, Kaiser Permanente has a mission to provide high-quality, affordable health care services and to improve the health of our members and the communities we serve. We currently serve more than 12.4 million members in eight states and the District of Columbia. Care for members and patients is focused on their total health and guided by their personal Permanente Medical Group physicians, specialists and team of caregivers. Our expert and caring medical teams are empowered and supported by industry-leading technology advances and tools for health promotion, disease prevention, state-of-the-art care delivery and world-class chronic disease management. Kaiser Permanente is dedicated to care innovations, clinical research, health education and the support of community health. For more information, go to: kp.org/share.