Meet-the-Experts Student Breakfast

Merwyn (Mitch) Greenlick, Ph.D.

Rep. Greenlick is professor emeritus and past chair of the Department of Public Health and Preventive Medicine in the Medical School at Oregon Health & Science University. He founded the Oregon Health Policy Institute at the University and was its director for nine years. Until July, 1995 Rep. Greenlick was director of the Kaiser Permanente Center for Health Research, which he founded in 1964, and vice president for research, Kaiser Foundation Hospitals.

Rep. Greenlick (D, HD33) was first elected to the Oregon House of Representatives in 2002. As a member of the minority during his first two sessions Rep. Greenlick built relationships with members of both parties and significantly influenced all of the major health legislation during those sessions. He sponsored several important health bills during that period, including one that created Oregon 's prescription bulk purchasing program. During the 74nd Legislative Assembly (2007) he serves as Chair of the House Committee on Health Care and moved a comprehensive agenda of health care bills through the committee and out of the House.

He has served as a consultant to the Department of Health and Human Services in many capacities and to the World Health Organization, serving on their Global Advisory Group on Health Systems Research. Rep. Greenlick has served as a research advisor to many projects throughout the country. In addition he has served as an advisor to several foreign governments, as well as numerous research and medical care institutions in the United States and abroad.

He received his B.S. (pharmacy) and M.S. (pharmacy administration) from Wayne State University in Detroit and his Ph.D. (medical care organization) from the University of Michigan.

He was elected to the National Academy of Science's Institute of Medicine in 1971 and has served on and chaired several Institute of Medicine (IOM) committees. He chaired the Committee on Community-based Drug Treatment which produced the landmark report on bridging the gap between substance abuse treatment researchers and providers. In addition, he chaired the IOM Committee on Post-Deployment Health Effects.

He was a founding member of the National Academy of Social Insurance and is a life fellow in the American Public Health Association. Rep. Greenlick is a distinguished fellow of AcademyHealth (formerly the Association for Health Services Research). In 1994 he was awarded AcademyHealth's Presidential Award for his life-time achievements in health services research. During the 1995-96 academic year Rep. Greenlick was a senior fellow at the Center for the Advanced Study of the Behavioral Sciences at Stanford University.

Rep. Greenlick received the Public Health Genius Award from Oregon's Community Health Partners in 2006, received the life-time achievement award from the Oregon Public Health Association, and was named Distinguished Alumnus by Wayne State University. He has been named the legislator of the year by several health care organizations. He currently serves as a trustee of the Northwest Health Foundation. He has published more than 200 books, articles and papers.