Our Team

Ms. Blatt currently leads a project to conduct consumer research to improve the Health Insurance Marketplace experience, choice, and decision-making. Since 2012, she has led dozens of projects on the web tools currently available on HealthCare.gov, and has conducted formative research, usability testing, consumer testing, survey research, and end-to-end testing for both the individual and SHOP Marketplaces. Ms. Blatt has also led projects that support the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services’ (CMS) public reporting of health care quality information, including the development and usability of Physician Compare and Home Health Compare web tools, and participated in projects on the Medicare.gov homepage, Medicare Plan Finder, and Hospital Compare web tools.

Ms. Blatt holds a Bachelor of Arts, summa cum laude, in Economics from the University of Pennsylvania.

Mr. Cavanaugh also serves as the Indigenous Ways of Knowing (IWOK) Evaluation Lead for the National Tribal Child Welfare Center for Innovation and Advancement, a cooperative agreement with the Children's Bureau, where he provides culturally responsive technical assistance to Tribal Title IV-B and IV-E programs. Previously, he was lead evaluator for the Children's Bureau's Center for Native Child and Family Resilience (2017–2023), where he supported tribal communities in building evidence to prevent child maltreatment and promote family wellbeing.

Mr. Cavanaugh holds Master of Arts degrees in Anthropology and American Indian Studies from Michigan State University and UCLA.

Prior to joining L&M, Ms. Cheng worked as a graduate research assistant at Yale University School of Public Health on mixed-methods research examining vaccine hesitancy and misinformation. In this role, she was responsible for conducting and analyzing interviews, coding qualitative data using NVivo, and analyzing survey data in Stata.

Ms. Cheng holds a Master of Public Health in Social and Behavioral Sciences from Yale University. 

Recent projects include leading a formative research study to explore perceptions, attitudes, and behavior around brain health and lowering the risk of dementia, for the Alzheimer's Association; assisting the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) in evaluating its Supportive Services Demonstration, testing whether new approaches to service coordination in HUD’s elderly housing properties support aging in place and reduce costly and potentially avoidable use of high-cost healthcare services; and leading a series of focus groups for CMS with providers and Medicare beneficiaries to understand the factors that impact preventive service utilization among vulnerable segments of the Medicare population. 

Ms. Crelia is fluent in Spanish and holds a Master of Public Health from Emory University Rollins School of Public Health.

Prior to joining L&M, Mr. de Prieto engaged in a research initiative with the Milken Institute where he collaborated with a team to evaluate the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on biological indicators among Latino youth. His contributions to this project encompassed comprehensive data analysis and enhanced the understanding of health disparities encountered by Latino communities throughout the pandemic.

Mr. de Prieto holds a Bachelor of Science in Public Health with a concentration in Biological Sciences from The George Washington University and is fluent in Spanish.

Ms. Dobson currently manages a consumer research contract for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) to support the development and improvement of Medicare decision-support tools and information. She has conducted dozens of projects aimed at improving communication about Medicare coverage and plan choice. These include developing and testing web- and paper-based materials about Medicare enrollment and coverage decisions, usability testing of online content and tools, and research to inform Medicare outreach messages and strategies. She also contributes to several of the firm’s Medicare policy evaluation and technical assistance projects.

Ms. Dobson holds a Master of Science from the Harvard School of Public Health and a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology from the University of Delaware.

Prior to joining L&M, Ms. Doherty held executive posts in a health maintenance organization, a major academic hospital, a community health center, and management consulting. Her work is published in national journals and has been presented to diverse audiences.

Ms. Doherty holds a Master of Health Services Administration from George Washington University.

Currently, Ms. Dranch assists in the evaluation of technical assistance activities provided under the Health Resources and Services Administration’s (HRSA) Rural Quality Improvement Technical Assistance (RQITA) program. She also supports the assessment of Improvement Activities in the current portfolio of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services’ (CMS) Alternative Payment Models. Additionally, Ms. Dranch conducts primary data collection and analysis for the CMS ACO REACH Model evaluation to inform its implementation.

Recently, Ms. Dranch assisted on a project for the National Council on Aging (NCOA) and the U.S. Administration for Community Living (ACL), to conduct multi-state case studies examining how state administrators are streamlining enrollment into Medicare Savings Programs (MSPs) using Medicare Part D Low-Income Subsidy (LIS) leads data. She also supported a study on behalf of Carequality, funded by The Sequoia Project, to document the evolution and impact of health data interoperability. Prior to joining L&M, Ms. Dranch interned for multiple community- and health-oriented non-profit organizations.

Ms. Dranch holds a Bachelor of Arts in Sociology from Emory University.

Dr. Fong’s recent work includes evaluating the effectiveness and impact of public health initiatives and programs on healthcare organizations, care workforce, and population health to help inform policy planning, support the workforce, and develop and implement culturally appropriate care services. At L&M, she currently focuses on assisting in studies to improve consumer-informed coverage decisions, care experiences, and outcomes with the Health Insurance Marketplace and Medicare.

Dr. Fong specializes in study design and research methodology, statistical modeling, and complex survey analysis. She is skilled in big data analytics and qualitative data analysis. Prior to joining L&M, Dr. Fong was an evaluation scientist at the VNS Health, where she completed a large-scale evaluation study that examined the impact of New York State’s Workforce Investment Organization training intervention on selected value-based payment measures among a homebound Medicaid long-term care plan member population.

Dr. Fong holds a Ph.D. in sociology from the University of Wisconsin at Madison. She also completed a National Institute of Mental Health Postdoctoral Fellowship with the Institute for Health, Health Care Policy and Aging Research at Rutgers University.

Prior to joining L&M, Ms. Hipwell worked as a Program and Community Engagement Associate at Children's Scholarship Fund Philadelphia, a nonprofit seeking to advance education equity in the Greater Philadelphia area. Her global health studies took her to Argentina, where she conducted research on neglected tropical diseases, and to Ecuador, where she designed and conducted a needs assessment for a local community development NGO.

Ms. Hipwell holds a Master of Public Health with a Concentration in Global Health from the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine and a Bachelor of Arts in Global Studies from Lehigh University.

In addition to her qualitative and policy-focused background, Ms. Johnson has extensive experience in leading projects for both Federal and commercial clients. Most recently, she has served as the Project Director for a portfolio of National Council on Aging (NCOA) projects focused on the feasibility of streamlining benefits enrollment for older adults into key public benefits and has published case studies documenting state approaches to streamlining enrollment into Medicare Savings Programs (MSPs). She also provided project management oversight and task leadership for the Center of Medicare & Medicaid Services Office of Minority Health aimed at improving health care access and quality for all CMS priority populations, and she leads a project assessing the Improvement Activities in the current portfolio of CMS Alternative Payment Models based on the statutory and regulatory definitions and criteria for the Merit-based Incentive Payment System (MIPS) performance. Currently, Ms. Johnson also leads the evaluation of technical assistance activities provided under the Health Resources and Services Administration’s (HRSA) Rural Quality Improvement Technical Assistance (RQITA) program.

Before joining L&M, Ms. Johnson held senior management positions in a national home care and infusion/specialty pharmacy company where she worked extensively in health care operations and management; just prior to that, she spent several years working in health policy research, focused primarily on federal health programs.

Ms. Johnson holds a Master of Business Administration in Health Administration from the University of Colorado.

Mr. Kassamali's recent work includes assisting state Medicaid Program Integrity Units to improve and build upon current operations, leveraging the use of artificial intelligence and machine learning to assist the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) in managing public comment periods, supporting overall education and outreach activities for Medicare value-based purchasing programs, and ongoing measure maintenance for quality reporting and performance. Mr. Kassamali has also led L&M’s multi-year projects prototyping and implementing the Outcome Measures Framework in the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality’s Registry of Patient Registries, evaluating CMS’ Medicare Part D opioid policy, and working with CMS to update the Medicare Physician Fee Schedule Practice Expense Relative Value Units. Additional project work has focused on program evaluation, operations improvement, and methods to combat fraud, waste, and abuse.

Prior to joining L&M, Mr. Kassamali worked as a management consultant, advising hospitals on financial, strategic, and operational matters, including strategic planning, ambulatory network development, cost-effectiveness, organizational alignment, and operational improvement. Prior to that, his consulting work focused primarily on health care finance, working with a range of clients on issues related to Medicaid financing, Medicare’s prospective payment systems, hospital service-line development, and due diligence for mergers and acquisitions transactions.

Mr. Kassamali holds a Master of Public Health in Health Management from the Yale School of Public Health in conjunction with the Yale School of Management, as well as an M.Sc. in Human Genetics and a B.Sc. in Biology from McGill University.

He has also worked extensively in internal business operations to improve financial performance, compliance with federal regulations, and working with government auditors on numerous large-scale contract and organizational audit programs.

Mr. Lane holds a Bachelor of Arts in international relations and French from the University of Virginia.

Ms. Marano’s expertise includes evaluating the Inflation Reduction Act’s (IRA) impact on Medicare beneficiaries and modernizing CMS’ Compare web tools by integrating hospital quality measures and patient-centric design into provider selection interfaces. With a clinical foundation as a Registered Nurse and a Master of Public Health degree, she combines technical rigor in mixed-methods research with a deep commitment to improving the consumer experience across Medicare, Medicaid, and Marketplace programs.

Ms. Marano holds a Master of Public Health from Boston University and a Bachelor of Science in Nursing from Georgetown University.

Ms. McPheron leads multi-year Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) projects focused on health care quality and delivery transformation. Currently, she serves as a lead evaluator for the CMS Innovation Center’s ACO REACH Model. She has extensive experience evaluating alternative payment models and value-based care initiatives at the national, regional, and state levels, spanning primary and specialty care, acute hospitals, inpatient psychiatric facilities, and rehabilitation centers. Her work has been published in peer-reviewed journals and featured in health care policy reports.

Prior to joining L&M, Ms. McPheron worked in management consulting with academic medical centers and health systems nationwide, specializing in strategic planning, ambulatory and inpatient operations improvement, and patient access redesign. She also held roles in corporate strategy for a national dialysis company and in health policy consulting focused on medically complex populations.

Ms. McPheron holds a Master of Public Health with a concentration in Health Care Management from the Yale School of Public Health in conjunction with the Yale School of Management.

Prior to joining L&M, Ms. Mitrano Heidenreich worked as a communications specialist intern for her local city government where she provided support for projects through in-depth research, including incorporating qualitative feedback for the city’s civics program for high school students. She has assisted in photography, editing and proofreading of print materials and helped compose and manage the City’s weekly e-Newsletter. She fostered community ties with residents and schools, and managed and organized student volunteers at City events.  

Ms. Mitrano Heidenreich holds a Bachelor of Science in Communications with a concentration in Journalism and double majored in Gender & Sexuality Studies at the University of Miami.  

Prior to joining L&M, Ms. Moeller completed an honors thesis at Appalachian State University on public high school teacher’s responses to changing LGBTQ+ policies in their state and school. She conducted background research, recruitment, interviews, qualitative coding, and synthesis of findings.

Ms. Moeller holds a Bachelor of Science in Sociology with a concentration in Power and Social Change from Appalachian State University.

Ms. Moriarty’s recent work includes communication research for the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), including projects aimed at improving communication around Medicare coverage and coverage options, plan and provider choice, health care quality, and Medicare program updates. Other recent projects have focused on operational and monitoring support, including a project to support CMS in responding to public comments related to the Physician Fee Schedule, another to assess plan sponsor compliance with CMS’s translation and accessibility requirements, and a project to monitor beneficiary experience and conduct marketing review activities for the Part D Senior Savings Model.  

Prior to joining L&M, Ms. Moriarty led numerous projects to consumer test Medicare forms, publications, and Web tools, managed projects to develop quality measures for Medicare Part D, and developed model marketing materials for the Part D program.  

Ms. Moriarty holds a Bachelor of Arts in religion, with a focus in bioethics, from Princeton University. 

Dr. Ng holds a Ph.D. in Health Services Research and Health Policy from Johns Hopkins University.

Prior to joining L&M, Ms. Ohanele was a research intern at the University of Maryland School of Public Health where she assisted a scoping review on analyzing racial disparities in cardiovascular health and cardiorespiratory research. Ms. Ohanele’s main responsibilities included analyzing large data sets, conducting in-depth interviews, and analyzing survey results with Excel. 

Ms. Ohanele holds a Bachelor of Science in Public Health Science from the University of Maryland.

Most recently, Ms. Rollo played a key role in the National Council on Aging (NCOA) portfolio of projects focused on improving public benefits enrollment for low-income older adults. She conducted environmental scans and literature reviews, stakeholder interviews, and policy analyses to identify strategies to streamline application and enrollment processes. Additionally, Ms. Rollo conducts qualitative and survey research to improve user experience with web tools and inform the development of outreach and education materials for the Health Insurance Marketplace and Medicare program. While at L&M, Ms. Rollo has also supported several projects for the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), ranging from reviewing public comments during rulemaking cycles to engaging with diverse populations to better understand their lived experiences accessing and using high quality health care services with Medicaid, Medicare, or Marketplace coverage.

Ms. Rollo holds a Master of Engineering from Lehigh University in Healthcare Systems Engineering and a Bachelor of Science from Lehigh University in Bioengineering.

Ms. Sarmiento holds a Master of Arts in Applied Sociology from American University in Washington, D.C.

Mr. Segal holds a Master of Business Administration from Northwestern University Kellogg School of Management with a concentration in healthcare and finance. 

At L&M, Ms. Sharma supports research, in English and Spanish, to refine and improve decision support tools and education materials for Medicare audiences, including beneficiaries, coming-of-agers, caregivers, and information intermediaries. She also supports the Centers for Medicare & Medicare Services (CMS) triage and analyze public comments on the Medicare Physician Fee Schedule, serving as an onboarding and training lead and synthesizing commenter feedback through narrative and visual reports. Additionally, Ms. Sharma works with the National Council on Aging (NCOA) and Administration for Community Living (ACL) on several workstreams focused on streamlining eligibility and enrollment processes for key public benefits programs for older adults. On these workstreams, she conducts or leads extensive literature reviews and key informant interviews to produce actionable recommendations for federal and state policymakers. Previously, she led a task for the CMS Office of Minority Health (OMH) to support stakeholder engagement and synthesize stakeholder policy priorities related to Medicaid, Medicare, and other CMS programs through listening sessions, panels, and other events.

Prior to joining L&M, Ms. Sharma worked with a consortium of scientists and health care providers in Massachusetts as a project manager and qualitative researcher to evaluate the impacts of Long COVID on marginalized communities. She also has experience in state government, program implementation, and education.

Ms. Sharma holds Master of Social Work and Master of Public Health degrees in macro social work, program implementation and evaluation, and maternal and child health from Boston University and a Bachelor of Science from Tufts University.

Previously, Ms. Shbeeb assisted with consumer research activities such as survey data analysis for the Medicare program. She also formerly performed periodic health plan marketing compliance activities and analyzed beneficiary complaints related to the Part D Senior Savings (PDSS) Model. Prior to joining L&M, Ms. Shbeeb was a Graduate Research Assistant in Tulane University’s Department of Health Policy and Management, where she used Louisiana Medicaid claims to assess the state’s behavioral health workforce capacity.

Ms. Shbeeb holds a Master of Public Health in Health Policy and a Bachelor of Science in Public Health and Economics from Tulane University.

Specifically, Mr. Sheets leads and supports several tasks for CMS in triaging and analyzing public comments on major Medicare regulations, serving as an onboarding and training lead and developing narrative and visual reports synthesizing commenter feedback. Additionally, he contributes to CMS’ innovation efforts through the CMMI Rapid Cycle Innovation Program, advising on rapid randomized controlled trial design and strategies to evaluate care delivery interventions within alternative payment models. He also supports the evaluation of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Integrated Wellness in Supportive Housing (IWISH) Model to understand the impact of housing-based supportive services on healthcare utilization and housing stability of low-income older adults, leading and supporting primary data collection (e.g., site visits, key informant interviews) and analysis activities and preparing briefing materials and summative reports. Additionally, he supports multiple workstreams for a contract focused on streamlining enrollment processes for older adults in key public benefit programs by conducting extensive literature reviews, environmental scans, and key informant interviews.

Prior to joining L&M, he worked at the American Institutes for Research (AIR), serving as a project lead on the CMS Center for Consumer Information and Insurance Oversight (CCIIO) Marketplace Operations Support contract, where he executed Qualified Health Plan (QHP) Certification reviews, developed policy options for future implementation into the Exchange, and coordinated stakeholder engagement efforts with internal and external stakeholders. Prior to AIR, he worked at AcademyHealth, where he provided qualitative research and project management support to an extensive portfolio of Medicaid-specific projects, which utilized multi-state Medicaid claims data to examine issues of importance to the Medicaid program while measuring the impact of state Medicaid policies on outcomes.

Mr. Sheets holds a Bachelor of Science in Health Sciences, specializing in health policy, from The Ohio State University.

Dr. Slanchev contributes to the development and programming of evaluation measures for the District of Columbia’s Section 1115 demonstration to improve services for Medicaid beneficiaries with substance use disorder (SUD) and serious mental illness (SMI). He has a leading role in the analysis of the determinants of beneficiary access to pharmacy networks that supports CMS’ monitoring of Medicare Advantage (MA) plans and Prescription Drug Plans (PDP). As part of this work, Dr. Slanchev has been analyzing how total drug costs and amount paid by patients vary by plan type, geography and pharmacy affiliation. 

Dr. Slanchev’s past work includes evaluating the impact of the Home Health Value-Based Purchasing (HHVBP) Model on home health agencies and various segments of home health users by using estimation techniques, including propensity score matching, entropy balancing, and difference-in-difference. He has worked on the sample design, weighting approach and quantitative analysis of several surveys aiming to help CMS effectively communicate with consumers eligible for Marketplace insurance. 

Dr. Slanchev holds a Ph.D. in Economics from Duke University. 

Multi-year program monitoring and evaluation comprise a large share of Ms. Szymanski's project experience; she has led or supported both large- and small-scale program evaluation efforts for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) and other federal clients. She also conducts information gathering and formative research to support federal decision-making, organizes technical assistance delivery and learning community programming, and supports website usability testing with consumers to improve the interface and experience with the Health Insurance Marketplace. Before joining L&M, she held project management and administrative positions at Arbor Research and the University of Michigan’s Health System and Institute for Social Research.

Ms. Szymanski holds a Bachelor of Arts in Sociology and Political Science from the University of Michigan.

Before joining L&M in 2014, Dr. Tisinger spent four years conducting evaluations at the Office of Inspector General for the US Department of Health & Human Services. Previously, as a survey researcher, he helped design national survey projects for the Kaiser Family Foundation, the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, the Pew Center for the People & the Press, National Public Radio, and the Washington Post. 

Dr. Tisinger holds a Ph.D. from the University of Pennsylvania’s Annenberg School for Communication. 

Ms. Tomai has provided analytic leadership on CMS contracts focused on accountable care and value-based primary care transformation, including evaluations of Shared Savings Program ACOs and the ACO Investment Model. Her work involved complex data integration across CMS sources and recreation of CMS attribution methodologies, enabling program- and population-specific analytic files for longitudinal evaluation. She currently leads analytic initiatives for non-CMS clients examining primary care delivery models for Medicare and Medicaid populations, including claims-based replication of CMS provider-beneficiary attribution methods, implementation and comparison of Hierarchical Condition Category risk adjustment models, and analysis of coding patterns, patient and provider mix, and spending trends across attribution approaches and payment models. Ms. Tomai has also supported CMS monitoring of Medicare Advantage and Prescription Drug Plans, delivering analyses of partial-benefit dual enrollees’ out-of-pocket costs in Medicare Advantage versus Dual Eligible Special Needs Plans (D-SNPs). She recently led an assessment of Medicare telehealth reimbursement policy during the COVID-19 public health emergency, modeling potential effects of alternative CMS payment policy scenarios.

Ms. Tomai holds a Master of Science in Public Policy Analysis from the University of Rochester.