Dr. Ayanian is the inaugural Director of the Institute for Healthcare Policy and Innovation which includes over 600 faculty members from 14 schools and colleges at the University of Michigan, where he is also the Alice Hamilton Professor of Medicine, Professor of Health Management and Policy, Professor of Public Policy, and a practicing general internist. He has led influential studies of access to care, quality of care, and health disparities related to race, ethnicity, socioeconomic factors, and insurance coverage. He currently leads a team of 15 faculty members conducting the federally-authorized evaluation of the Healthy Michigan Plan, which has expanded Medicaid coverage to more than 650,000 adults in Michigan. From 2014 through 2016 he served as an Associate Editor of the New England Journal of Medicine.

Dr. Ayanian is a Master of the American College of Physicians and an elected member of the National Academy of Medicine, American Society for Clinical Investigation, Association of American Physicians, and Alpha Omega Alpha. He has received the John Eisenberg National Award for Career Achievement in Research from the Society of General Internal Medicine and the Distinguished Investigator Award from AcademyHealth. He earned his bachelor’s degree in history and political science from Duke University, medical degree from Harvard Medical School, and master of public policy degree from the Harvard Kennedy School. He completed residency and fellowship training in primary care internal medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and a post-doctoral fellowship in health services research at the Harvard School of Public Health.