Professional Organizations

I. What’s What in Health Policy >> H. Health Policy Research Organizations >> Professional Organizations

These are the major professional organizations whose members are involved in health policy/health services research.

• Academy for Healthcare Improvement (AHI). AHI’s mission is to foster an interprofessional community that advances quality improvement in health care through scholarly and educational activities.
• AcademyHealth. AcademyHealth is a leading national organization serving the fields of health services and policy research and the professionals who produce and use this important work. Together with our members, we offer programs and services that support the development and use of rigorous, relevant and timely evidence to increase the quality, accessibility, and value of health care, to reduce disparities, and to improve health. A trusted broker of information, AcademyHealth brings stakeholders together to address the current and future needs of an evolving health system, inform health policy, and translate evidence into action.
• American Association of Healthcare Consultants
• American Political Science Association, Health Politics and Policy Section. The organized section on Health Politics and Policy provides the ideal infrastructure in which members can more thoroughly, efficiently arm themselves with the additional expertise we need to explore health politics and policy questions. The Section will define “health politics and policy” just as broadly as the phrase implies. Everything from the politics of Medicare Part D to the politics of women’s health; everything from comparative politics of AIDS in Africa, Eastern Europe, and South Asia to the comparative state politics of Medicaid and SCHIP, everything from the ethics of end of life decisions to the regulation of stem cell research, everything from public budgeting and regulation to public health disaster preparedness – all these and more fall with the scope of the Section.
• American Public Health Association (APHA). The APHA is the oldest and most diverse organization of public health professionals in the world and has been working to improve public health since 1872. The Association aims to protect all Americans, their families and their communities from preventable, serious health threats and strives to assure community-based health promotion and disease prevention activities and preventive health services are universally accessible in the United States. APHA represents a broad array of health professionals and others who care about their own health and the health of their communities.
• American Society of Health Economists (ASHEcon). ASHEcon is a professional organization dedicated to promoting excellence in health economics research in the United States. ASHEcon provides a forum for emerging ideas and empirical results of health economics research. The major activity through which ASHEcon achieves its mission is conducting a biennial meeting in the US. ASHEcon is governed by a Board of Directors comprised of a highly distinguished group of health economists from all parts of the United States.
• Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management (APPAM). APPAM is dedicated to improving public policy and management by fostering excellence in research, analysis, and education.
• International Society of Pharmacoeconomics and Outcomes Research (ISPOR). ISPOR promotes the science of pharmacoeconomics (health economics) and outcomes research (the scientific discipline that evaluates the effect of health care interventions on patient well-being including clinical, economic, and patient-centered outcomes) and facilitates the translation of this research into useful information for healthcare decision-makers to increase the efficiency, effectiveness, and fairness of health care to improve health.
• National Academy of Social Insurance (NASI). NASI is a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization made up of the nation’s leading experts on social insurance. Its mission is to advance solutions to challenges facing the nation by increasing public understanding of how social insurance contributes to economic security.
• Society of General Internal Medicine (SGIM). SGIM is a national medical society of 3,000 physicians who are the primary internal medicine faculty of every medical school and major teaching hospital in the United States. SGIM members teach medical students, residents, and fellows how to care for adult patients. They also conduct research that improves primary care, preventative measures, and treatment services for patients.  Their mission is to lead excellence, change, and innovation in clinical care, education, and research in general internal medicine to achieve health care delivery that is comprehensive, technologically-advanced and individualized; instills trust within a culture of respect; is efficient in the use of time, people, and resources; is organized and financed to achieve optimal health outcomes; maximizes equity, and continually learns and adapts.
• Society of Medical Decision Making (SMDM). SMDM’s mission is to improve health outcomes through the advancement of proactive systematic approaches to clinical decision making and policy-formation in health care by providing a scholarly forum that connects and educates researchers, providers, policy-makers, and the public. Its membership includes trainees to senior researchers as well as educators, clinicians, managers, and policy makers. It is an international society with almost 25% of its members from outside of the U.S.