The Government Accountability Office last week appointed two “faster cures” patient advocates and a former insurance company executive now on the AARP board to the three slots reserved for patient and consumer representatives on the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute board, which will oversee comparative effectiveness research under health care reform.
The reform legislation passed last March gave GAO the job of appointing the 17 public members, which also includes five representatives of private payers, five physicians, and three industry representatives (one each for drugs, devices and diagnostic manufacturers). A full list can be found here.
The three “patient and consumer” representatives are:
- Ellen Sigal, chair, Friends of Cancer Research.
Sigal is an outspoken advocate for more money for cancer research. Her board is comprised largely of fellow executives in the research community, including staff from the American Cancer Society, Research America!, and the American Society of Clinical Oncology, which represents cancer docs. She serves on numerous non-profit boards, including the Reagan-Udall Foundation set up by the Food and Drug Administration to expedite drug development; and has served on numerous Institute of Medicine panels investigating new ways of conducting cancer research that can lead to faster access to new medicines.