Neel Shah was the first Elliot M. Stone Intern selected for the program.  He has now completed a Master of Public Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government, as well as a Doctor of Medicine degree at Brown University.  Neel worked on the Health Information Privacy and Security Collaboration project, contributed to the reports that were produced during the September 2007 – June 2008 period, and co-authored a paper entitled “Can We Resolve the HIT Privacy Conundrum?  The Massachusetts Experience.”  Neel presented his findings to the Consortium’s annual conference on June 6, 2008.  Neel’s undergraduate degree was a B.S. in Neuroscience at Brown, and while an undergraduate he served as an emergency medical technician, as well as an intern in the New Jersey State House.  He is currently forming a non-profit organization, Costs of Care, that seeks to inform physicians about the costs and benefits of various therapy alternatives.

Natasha Khouri is working on a Masters of Science in Health Policy at the Harvard School of Public Health.  Natasha's project is on the topic of health disparities.  Specifically, she has examined the implementation of the new race and ethnicity reporting requirements for hospitals in Massachusetts.  The methodology is a survey of the hospitals to determine how they are implementing these regulations, how they impact providers, and how the accuracy of the data is ensured.  This issue is of particular interest, as it relates to the state's health care reform initiative and reducing racial and ethnic disparities is one of the Health Care Quality and Cost Council's three primary goals.  Natasha's undergraduate degree was an A.B. in History and African Studies at Duke, and she subsequently did an intensive Spanish language study in Guatemala. 

Jaffy Phillips is working on a Masters in Public Health at the BU School of Public Health.  Jaffy's project is related to behavioral health, specifically looking at the barriers to inter-operability for behavioral health services.  The study researches the use of electronic health records in behavioral health through literature review and interviews with subject matter experts in the field.  The Consortium’s Behavioral Health Forum has served as an important resource for this project.  The final report addresses implementation and adoption of health information technology among behavioral health providers.  Jaffy's undergraduate degree is a B.A. in Cultural Anthropology from Amherst College (including junior year abroad in Kenya), and she has an M.A. in Somatic Psychology from Naropa University in Boulder.