Author: Hillit Meidar-Alfi

The Health Foundation of South Florida, the region’s largest philanthropic organization focused on achieving health equity in historically disadvantaged communities, recently named Melida Akiti as its new Board Chair. I recently interviewed Akiti to learn more about her vision for the Health Foundation and her hyper-local approach to closing the gap on health disparities among racial groups in South Florida.

Steve Leifman has made it his life’s work to help people with mental illnesses. Now, an Associate Administrative Judge in the County Criminal Division of the Eleventh Judicial Circuit of Florida, covering Miami-Dade County, Judge Leifman’s name has become synonymous with the movement to keep people with mental illnesses out of jail and into appropriate medical and psychiatric treatment. To learn how data has helped him shape his successful programs, I sat down with Judge Leifman and asked him to share his insights.

Over the past decade, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) has shifted its payment structures away from volume-based care and toward value-based care. To discuss some of the challenges that providers face with this switch to value-based care, I spoke with Thao Tran, M.D., MPH, a physiatrist and the Chief Medical Officer and Chief Quality Officer for Provider Network Solutions in Miami.