Core Team

Sarah Collins, M.B.A.
President
Sarah has 20 years of reimbursement experience, across major payer types and care settings. She has done extensive consulting related to managed care and Medicare, biotechnology and oncology, and new product assessment. Sarah's experience has given her a deep understanding of the multiple drivers in the U.S. healthcare reimbursement system and how these drivers interact to create change.

Sarah's 2011 focus has been developing proposals for innovative approaches to two important and costly disease states: diabetes and atrial fibrillation (AF). She has written for the peer-reviewed Journal of Commercial Biotechnology and for Managed Care Magazine, Biotechnology Healthcare, and Specialty Pharmacy News. America'sHealth presented at the Academy of Managed Care Pharmacy (AMCP) annual conference.

Ross Miller, MD, MPH, FACPE
Ross has served in medical leadership positions for 25+ years. At CIGNA, Ross was Vice President and Senior Medical Director responsible for all quality management for seven years. He also held leadership positions in CIGNA's medical management departments and served on its national P&T Committee. As Chief Medical Officer of community health centers in Los Angeles County, which serve primarily uninsured and underserved safety net patients, Ross had a wide range of responsibilities.

Ross is actively involved with the Medicaid population in California. In addition, he is an executive with Cerner and a leading industry consultant. Ross has published, lectured, and presented extensively on numerous clinical and managed care topics. He has also developed continuing education (CE) materials for multiple healthcare professional audiences.

Kip Piper, M.A., FACHE
Kip's 25+ years of experience include both government and private payers at the federal and state levels. He worked within CMS and at the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) and served as Wisconsin's State Health Commissioner and Medicaid Program Director. In addition, Kip held senior executive positions with WellPoint and AcademyHealth. He has led national projects on quality improvement and payment reform and has testified before Congress on Medicaid and Medicare policy.

Currently, Kip advises Fortune 500 companies, Medicaid programs, managed care plans, and other organizations. Kip is health policy editor of American Health & Drug Benefits and editor of GetInsideHealth. His blog, the Piper Report, provides insights into current health policy issues.

Renee Rizzo Fleming, R.Ph, M.B.A.
Renee has 20+ years of leadership experience in managed care pharmacy, including as Vice President of Corporate Pharmacy Services at HealthNow New York. At HealthNow, she oversaw the management of pharmacy benefits for 800,000 beneficiaries, annually encompassing over 7 million prescriptions and a cost of nearly $400 million. Renee's responsibilities included formulary management, drug therapy management, contracting, manufacturer relations, employer group benefit design, pharmacy network management, and disease and health management activities.

Renee has served in several leadership positions within the BCBS system, including the Drug and Pharmacy Advisory Board and the National Council of Physician Executives. She has also held a number of Academy of Managed Care Pharmacy (AMCP) leadership roles.

Beth Lesher, Pharm.D., BCPS
Beth is a board-certified pharmacotherapy specialist with 15+ years of experience in a variety of pharmacy roles. She is currently specializing in communicating medical information via multiple vehicles to various audiences, including healthcare providers, healthcare decision-makers, and patients. She writes both peer-reviewed and non-peer-reviewed literature: examples include research reports, continuing pharmacy and medical education (CPE/CME) articles, monographs, and AMCP dossiers. Additionally, she writes for other media outlets, including both live and Web-based programs. In total, Beth is credited with more than 20 presentations and 50 publications of various types.

Beth has experience in various therapeutic areas, such as cardiology, oncology, psychiatry, endocrinology, immunology, microbiology, pulmonology, and urology, as well as surgical procedures and products. She has worked on projects focused on numerous disease states, including arrhythmias, depression, diabetes, heart failure, hypertension, renal failure, osteoporosis, schizophrenia, and various cancers and infectious diseases.

Michael Collins, M.D.
Mike is an internist with 30+ years of experience treating Medicaid, Medicare, commercial, and underserved beneficiaries. For the last decade, he has treated primarily Medicaid and Medicare beneficiaries. He treated commercial patients for more than two decades, including 21 years with Kaiser Permanente Health Plan and as an internist employed by a nonprofit, hospital-based healthcare system. Mike is an empathetic and astute physician with strengths in correct diagnosis, cost-efficient treatment, and patient counseling.

Clinical Sciences and Technology Assessment Senior Advisor, M.D., Ph.D.
Our Clinical Sciences and Technology Assessment Senior Advisor has 20+ years of medical technology assessment and health policy analysis experience. His expertise includes health economics and outcomes research (HEOR) and high-level clinical trial design strategies.

As Executive Director of Technology Assessment and Clinical Affairs at a leading HEOR consulting firm, he led the firm's work on pharmacoeconomic (PE) registries to assess the impact of biopharma agents, via collection and integration of clinical, economic, and patient-reported outcomes data. He has conducted a range of medical technology assessment, clinical decision analysis, and health services projects. He has considerable expertise in oncology and personalized medicine, including oncology biomarkers. He also has provided extensive technical assistance to a range of public and private sector clients in the planning, management, and evaluation of healthcare and science and technology programs.

Market Research and Communications Leader, M.B.A., M.S.
Our Market Research and Communications Leader has 20+ years of experience
developing and executing programs for new and existing biopharma and diagnostic products. She has developed and executed many qualitative and quantitative market research programs across a wide spectrum of physician specialties, other healthcare professionals (OHPs), and payers. She has guided the development of communications strategies and materials, including peer-reviewed publications, abstracts, conference presentations, websites, and educational materials. The audiences for her work have been diverse, including private and public payers, physicians, OHPs, regulatory officials, and patients. She previously served as Vice President of a leading global medical communications company, in key marketing and new product planning positions in pharmaceutical companies, and at a major PBM.

Senior Coding Specialist, CPC
Our coding specialist has 10+ years of experience across different coding systems, payers, and virtually all settings of care. She has a great depth and variety of experience with coding across different coding systems, including HCPCS, CPT-5, ICD-10, NDC, DRG, and APC. She has been a Certified Professional Coder (CPC) for 10 years. She has 20+ years of experience in the provider, reimbursement consulting, and pharmaceutical sales arenas.