Jessie Gruman

Jessie Gruman is the founder and president of the Center for the Advancement of Health, an independent, non-profit Washington-based policy institute funded by the Annenberg Foundation, the W.K. Kellogg Foundation and other foundations.

Since it was established in 1992 the Center has worked in collaboration with employers, government, health insurers, clinicians, the media and the scientific community to "build an America where everyone is prepared to live a healthy life and make effective choices about their health care."

Dr. Gruman has worked on this same set of concerns in the private sector (AT&T), the public sector (National Institutes of Health) and the voluntary health sector (American Cancer Society). She holds a BA from Vassar College and a PhD in social Psychology from Columbia University. She is a Professorial Lecturer in the School of Public Health and Health Services at The George Washington University and serves on the boards of trustees of the Advisory Panel on Medicare Education of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, the Center for Information Therapy, the Sallan Foundation and the Public Health Institute.

Dr. Gruman was honored by Research!America for her leadership in advocacy for health research and received honorary doctorates in public policy from Carnegie Mellon University and public service from Northeastern University and Salve Regina University, and the Presidential Medal of The George Washington University. She is a member of the Society for Behavioral Medicine, the Association for Psychological Science and the Council on Foreign Relations.

Dr. Gruman is the author of AfterShock: What to Do When the Doctor Gives You – or Someone You Love – a Devastating Diagnosis (Walker Publishing, 2007) a book about how people use scientific information to make decisions about their healthcare, and Behavior Matters: 15 Years of Health Behavior Advocacy, as well as scientific papers and opinion essays and articles published in the national media.

For further biographical information, see Who's Who in America (60th Edition).