Policy Briefing

Substance Abuse, Families and Welfare Reform
May 10, 2002 Washington, D.C.

Speakers’ Biographical Information

Sheldon Danziger, Ph.D.
Dr. Danziger holds three positions at the University of Michigan. He is a Henry J. Meyer Collegiate Professor of Social Work and Public Policy; Director of the Research and Training Program on Poverty, the Underclass and Public Policy; and Director of the Center on Poverty, Risk, and Mental Health. His research focuses on trends in poverty and inequality and the effects of economic and demographic changes and government social programs on disadvantaged groups. He is the co-author of America Unequal (Harvard University Press, 1995) and Detroit Divided (Russell Sage Foundation, 2000), and co-editor of Understanding Poverty (Harvard University Press, 2002) and Securing the Future: Investing in Children From Birth to College (Russell Sage Foundation, 2000), and numerous other volumes and papers.

Marjorie Gutman, Ph.D.
Dr. Gutman is Director of Prevention Research at the Treatment Research Institute (TRI) affiliated with the University of Pennsylvania. Dr. Gutman’s research and grantmaking over the years have focused on substance abuse prevention for at-risk children, and multi-component, integrated packages of services for low-income women and families involved in substance abuse. Her mission at TRI has been to build a program of research in those areas, which now includes studies of families involved in welfare reform and substance abuse, and of family and neighborhood oriented prevention programs. Dr. Gutman is also Co-director of the Substance Abuse Policy Research Program, which supports studies that will produce relevant information on public and private substance abuse policy interventions. Prior to coming to TRI, she was a Senior Program Officer at the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation for nine years, where she developed and collaborated on evaluations of multi-site national programs, commissioned research studies, and new initiatives. Earlier in her career, she developed evaluations for the New Jersey State Department of Health, and was Assistant Professor at State University of New York, Downstate Medical Center.

Michael McGinnis, M.D.
Dr. McGinnis is Senior Vice President and Director of the Health Group at the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. Previously, Dr. McGinnis was Scholar-in-Residence at the National Academy of Sciences. He served through four successive Administrations (1977-1995) as Assistant Surgeon General, Deputy Assistant Secretary for Health, and Director of the U.S. Office of Disease Prevention and Health Promotion. During this time, Dr. McGinnis founded and served as Principal Architect for the Healthy People process to establish and implement national health goals and objectives, the Dietary Guidelines for Americans (jointly issued by HHS and USDA), the first Surgeon General’s Report on Nutrition and Health, and the US Preventive Services Task Force which produced the Guide to Clinical Preventive Services. He also has extensive international experience, which includes service as chair of the task force to rebuild the health sector in Bosnia and as State Coordinator for the smallpox eradication program India. He has a B.A. from the University of California at Berkeley, M.D. and M.A. from the University of California at Los Angeles, and an M.P.P. from Harvard University. He is a Member of the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences, and a Fellow of the American College of Epidemiology and the American College of Preventive Medicine.

Thomas McLellan, Ph.D.
Dr. McLellan is a psychologist and Professor of Psychiatry at the University of Pennsylvania, in addition to the Director of the Treatment Research Institute in Philadelphia. He was educated at Colgate University, Bryn Mawr College, and Oxford University. He has published more than 350 articles and chapters on addiction research and serves as the Editor in Chief of the Journal of Substance Abuse Treatment. Dr. McLellan and his colleagues created measurement instruments such as the Addiction Severity Index (ASI) and the Treatment Services Review (TSR). These instruments have been translated into over 20 languages and are the most widely used instruments of their kind in the world. He and his colleagues have used these instruments to evaluate a wide variety of therapies, medication, and interventions used in the treatment of alcohol and drug dependence. He and his colleagues are currently pursuing questions such as “What are the active and inactive ingredients of treatment,” “What is the appropriate duration and content of treatment for various types of patients,” and “How do we transfer findings from treatment research into practical applications for the practitioner and provider?”

Lisa Metsch, Ph.D.
Dr. Metsch is Associate Professor of Epidemiology and Public Health at the University of Miami School of Medicine. Dr. Metsch's funded research and publications focus on behavioral interventions in substance abuse and HIV. Dr. Metsch is the Principal Investigator of three CDC-funded, randomized intervention trials addressing primary and secondary prevention needs for HIV-infected populations. She is also Principal Investigator on a grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s Substance Abuse Policy Research Program entitled, “Moving Substance Users from Welfare to Work in the State of Florida: The Impact of Welfare Reform and Drug Treatment.” For her accomplishments, Dr. Metsch was awarded a career development award from the National Institute on Drug Abuse. She received her B.A. from Columbia University and M.A. and Ph.D. in Medical Sociology from the University of Florida.

Jon Morgenstern, Ph.D.
Dr. Morgenstern is Vice President and Director of Treatment Research at the National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University. He is also Associate Professor of Psychiatry and Health Policy at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine where he directs a special treatment program for disadvantaged substance abusing women. For the last six years, Dr. Morgenstern has served as an advisor to the New Jersey Department of Human Services (NJDHS) on issues related to welfare reform and substance abuse. He is Principal Investigator of a study being conducted in two counties in New Jersey in collaboration with NJDHS. The goal of the study is to test the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of two approaches to treat substance abusing TANF recipients.

Harold Pollack, Ph.D.
Dr. Pollack is Assistant Professor of Health Management and Policy at the University of Michigan School of Public Health. Dr. Pollack served as a member of the Institute of Medicine Committee on Nutrition Services for Medicare Beneficiaries, and is now a member of the IOM Data for Resource Allocation, Planning, and Evaluation Committee for the Ryan White Care Act. His recent research concerns the prevalence of substance abuse among welfare recipients, infant mortality reduction in severely disadvantaged populations, and the cost-effectiveness of harm reduction in prevention of HIV and Hepatitis C. Dr. Pollack's recent policy research appears in the Journal of the American Medical Association, Medical Decision Making, Pediatrics, the American Journal of Public Health, and other publications. He received his doctorate in Public Policy from Harvard University.