Title

Scientist, Senior Lecturer, and Associate Director, Health: Science, Society and Policy (HSSP) Program

The Heller School for Social Policy and Management

Expertise

health care management, health care reform, science policy, clinical trials, pharmaceuticals, medical devices, medical technology

Profile

Darren Zinner is a Social Scientist at the Schneider Institute for Health Policy and a Senior Lecturer at the Heller School of Social Policy & Management, both at Brandeis University. He is also a senior member of Brandeis University’s Health Industry Forum, a policy consortium of major health insurers, delivery system managers, and biopharmaceutical and medical device firms. In addition, Dr. Zinner teaches about the management of health care to graduate students in the MD-MBA program and pre-med students in the undergraduate health major.

Dr. Zinner’s research focuses on the management and structure of the U.S. healthcare enterprise. With the Harvard University/Massachusetts General Hospital Institute for Health Policy, he focuses on the management of science, especially how the funding and organization of scientific teams affects productivity and outcomes. He has conducted several national research surveys studying the implications of academic-industry relationships on the productivity and innovativeness of life scientists.

At the Heller School, Dr. Zinner studies how physicians and hospitals are responding to public and private healthcare reform to re-organize the compensation, structure, and information systems within provider organizations. He has managed national surveys of risk-based contracting among integrated physician groups, as well as conducted qualitative evaluations of capitation- and shared savings-based insurance demonstrations.

Prior to his academic appointment, Dr. Zinner worked for Covance Health Economics and Outcomes Services, where he led multiple consulting engagements concerning the clinical development, insurance reimbursement, and product launch strategy for novel biotech, pharmaceutical, and device products. Previously, he worked as a biomedical engineer designing and developing laparoscopic instruments for United States Surgical Corporation.

Dr. Zinner earned his doctoral degree in Health Policy from Harvard University, masters degree in Technology and Policy from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and bachelors degree in mechanical engineering from Duke University. Dr. Zinner has published in leading medical journals, including the New England Journal of Medicine, Journal of the American Medical Association, and Health Affairs, and is the inventor on two medical device patents.