Speakers

Meena Seshamani, MD, PhD is an accomplished, strategic leader with a deep understanding of health economics and a heart-felt commitment to outstanding patient care. Her diverse background as a health care executive, health economist, physician and health policy expert has given her a unique perspective on how health policy impacts the real lives of patients.  As Deputy Administrator and Director of the Center for Medicare at the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, Dr. Seshamani is responsible for policy and operations for the health care coverage of more than 64 million Americans in the Medicare program, with an annual budget of roughly $1 trillion.  Since joining CMS, Dr. Seshamani has led her nearly 1,000 person team through historic transformation to further the agency’s goals to advance health equity, expand access to coverage and care, drive innovation for high-quality, whole-person care, and promote affordability and sustainability of the Medicare program for generations to come. She has driven bold policymaking in the Traditional Medicare, Medicare Advantage, value-based care, and drug affordability spaces through proactive, thoughtful engagement with external stakeholders, and by creating a work environment in which people feel valued and their hard work is celebrated to truly drive operational excellence.  She is also the senior official responsible for CMS’s implementation activities under the Inflation Reduction Act, which make the largest changes to the Medicare program since the enactment of Part D in 2003.

Dr. Seshamani is a Hopkins-trained surgeon and Oxford-trained PhD economist, where she was a Marshall Scholar.  Prior to joining CMS, she served as Vice President of Clinical Care Transformation at MedStar Health, where she conceptualized, designed, and implemented population health and value-based care initiatives and served on the senior leadership of the 10 hospital, 300+ outpatient care site health system. She also cared for patients as a head and neck surgeon at MedStar Georgetown University Hospital and at Kaiser Permanente in San Francisco.

Dr. Seshamani also brings decades of policy experience to her role, including serving on the leadership of the Biden-Harris Transition HHS Agency Review Team. Prior to MedStar Health, she was Director of the Office of Health Reform at the US Department of Health and Human Services, where she drove strategy and led implementation of the Affordable Care Act across the Department, including coverage policy, delivery system reform, and public health policy.