Staff | LTQA

Mary Kaschak – Executive Director

Ms. Kaschak is Executive Director of the Long-Term Quality Alliance in Washington, DC. She comes to the Alliance with ten years of experience in aging and health policy, most recently as Deputy Director of the Aging and Disability Business Institute at the National Association of Area Agencies on Aging (n4a). At the Business Institute, Ms. Kaschak played a lead role in advancing the readiness and business acumen of community-based organizations (CBOs) to successfully engage in the design and delivery of integrated care systems for older adults and younger adults with disabilities. Ms. Kaschak’s responsibilities at the Business Institute included business development, grant management, and oversight of day-to-day operations.

» Read more

Prior to her time with the Business Institute, Ms. Kaschak worked with n4a in several other capacities. She served as n4a’s Senior Program Manager of Capacity Building and Integrated Care, Program Manager of CBO Capacity Development, and Program Coordinator of Medicare and Benefits Outreach. Ms. Kaschak studied Gerontology at Miami University.

» Collapse

Claire Jensen – Manager, Policy and Communications

Claire Jensen is Policy and Communications Manager of the Long-Term Quality Alliance, where she supports LTQA research and manages member engagement and communication. Ms. Jensen brings several years of experience in policy, research, and advocacy spaces both domestically and internationally. She previously worked at LTQA as a Policy Analyst in 2016-17.

Prior to her current role at LTQA, Ms. Jensen supported public health policy research projects at the African Institute for Development Policy in Malawi after completing a Global Health Corps fellowship there. She was also a 2015 National Academy of Social Insurance intern at the Social Security Advisory Board. Ms. Jensen has a Master of Social Work with a concentration in Policy Practice from Columbia University School of Social Work and Bachelor of Arts from Bryn Mawr College in East Asian Studies with a minor in Sociology.

G. Lawrence Atkins – Consultant

Dr. Atkins is a Consultant for the Long-Term Quality Alliance in Washington, DC. He is a Board member and immediate past-President of the National Academy of Social Insurance. He was recently the Staff Director of the federal Commission on Long-Term Care, which issued its final report in September 2013. Prior to that, he was Executive Director, U.S. Public Policy at the global pharmaceutical manufacturer Merck.

Dr. Atkins is a veteran of more than 30 years of health and social policy analysis, policy development, and legislative representation at the local, state, and federal levels. He directed Public Policy at Schering-Plough Corporation; was founder and President of Health Policy Analysts, Inc., a firm providing consultation on pharmaceutical, health benefits, and health care reimbursement issues; was Executive Director of the Corporate Health Care Coalition, an alliance of Fortune 100 companies on federal and state health reform issues; and headed a health and benefits policy practice in the Washington office of the New York law firm Winthrop, Stimson, Putnam and Roberts. During the 1990s, Dr. Atkins served on two quadrennial Social Security Advisory Commissions – 1991 as a Commission member and 1995 as a member of the Technical Panel.

» Read more

During the 1980s, Dr. Atkins served on the U.S. Senate Special Committee on Aging as professional staff, Deputy Staff Director and Republican Staff Director for Chairman John Heinz (R-PA), and advised Senator Heinz as a member of the Senate Finance Committee on retirement income and health policy matters, and as a member of the 1983 National Commission on Social Security Reform. Prior to his work in the Congress, Dr. Atkins developed health and human services policy at the state and local government levels.

Dr. Atkins holds a Ph.D. from the Heller School for Social Policy and Management at Brandeis University, where he is currently a member of the Board of Overseers. He holds master degrees from the University of Louisville and the University of Kentucky, and an undergraduate degree from Kenyon College.

» Collapse

Anne Tumlinson – Consultant

Anne Tumlinson has over two decades of research and consulting experience in post-acute and long-term care financing and delivery. Her consulting firm, Anne Tumlinson Innovations, helps organizations respond to demographic changes and delivery system reform, with a special emphasis on addressing gaps in financing for long-term services and supports for older adults with long-term care need. Her research focuses on measuring the impact on Medicare acute spending of managing the long-term social supports and services needs of frail older adults. Anne has testified before Congress and appeared before the Long-Term Care Commission, and the Bipartisan Policy Center.

» Read more

Anne has also created a consumer website, www.daughterhood.org, to generate better content and information for consumers navigating the health and elder care systems on behalf of their parents; and to create a community of women who can educate and inform each other. The daughterhood blog is distributed to subscribers, HuffPost50 readers and MariaShriver.com readers, as well as to a growing social media following. In support of this work, Anne researches, writes and speaks about innovation in aging services product and content design, with blogs in Health Affairs and McKnights.

Anne served previously as a Senior Vice President at Avalere Health, where she founded and led Avalere’s post-acute and long-term care consulting practice for 14 years. There she created, developed and launched a data-based provider navigation tool to improve collaboration and coordination between hospitals and post-acute care providers in making discharge placement decisions for frail older adults. She led many analytic and modeling projects that analyzed the impact of functional impairment on health care spending. Prior to that, she led Medicaid program oversight at the federal Office of Management and Budget, conducted health services research at LifePlans, Inc and worked as a health and aging policy aide for Congressman John Lewis (D-GA). She earned a Masters in Human Services Management from the Heller School at Brandeis University.

» Collapse

Serena Lowe – Consultant

Serena Lowe has spent the past twenty years focused on furthering public policies and innovative solutions for promoting the health and socioeconomic empowerment of low-income working families, individuals with disabilities, seniors, children, immigrants, refugees and other at-risk populations. Earlier in her career, Serena served in a variety of leadership roles in the field of federal government relations, working for a Fortune 100 global biopharmaceutical company, a top 20 national lobbying firm, and two former Members of Congress (focusing on budgetary and policy priorities related to health care reform, entitlement restructuring, rural community revitalization and economic development). Serena has also lived for short periods of time in three countries outside of the United States and has held policy positions working for leaders within the British House of Commons and the Israeli Ministry of Health.

In 2009, Serena launched AnereS Strategies LLC, a dynamic government relations consulting enterprise that worked with private insurers, biotechnology companies and research entities; community-based organizations & national non-profit entities; and state/federal government agencies on various initiatives aimed at improving the socioeconomic advancement of individuals with multiple barriers to the economic mainstream. This critical work included developing innovative payment models, public policy strategies and sophisticated systems-change initiatives focused on improving the quality and outcomes of investments in addressing the social determinants of health of at-risk populations (including individuals with chronic health conditions and disabilities, older Americans, immigrant populations, and low-income workers and families). During this time, Serena also served as the first Executive Director of the Collaboration to Promote Self-Determination (CPSD), a coalition of national disability organizations and state associations committed to developing innovative policy strategies for reforming America’s long-term care system for youth and adults with disabilities so as to promote inclusive education, competitive integrated employment, independent living, and full participation in all aspects of typical community life. Serena has recently relaunched AnereS Strategies LLC (in January 2020) upon her transition from public service in the federal government.

» Read more

For the past eight years, Serena served as a Senior Policy Adviser for both the U.S. Department of Labor’s Office of Disability Employment Policy (ODEP), and more recently at the Administration for Community Living (ACL) within the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services. At ODEP, Serena was responsible for managing the Employment First State Leadership Mentoring Program (EFSLMP), an innovative technical assistance program supporting states in the alignment of policy, payment and practice across various systems to promote competitive, integrated employment as the preferred outcome of publicly-financed supports for individuals with significant disabilities. In her role as senior policy adviser within HHS, Serena served as the key liaison from ACL on the Center for Medicare & Medicaid Services’ (CMS) federal HCBS implementation team, which is responsible for supporting states in the successful implementation of the federal 2014 regulation on Medicaid Home & Community Based Services. In her various roles in public service, Serena has advocated for affordable, accessible housing; inclusive, high quality education; common-sense personalized approaches to medicine and health care; diverse workforce training initiatives that lead to professional opportunities at livable wages; and strong transportation and child care supports for working families.

Serena holds a B.A. in International & Public Affairs from Westminster College, a joint-graduate degree (M.P.H. in International Health Policy and M.A. in International Development Policy) from George Washington University, and a PhD in Public Administration from American University. Serena also teaches part-time on the graduate MPA faculty of Rutgers University’s School of Public Affairs and Administration. Serena is also a past recipient of the prestigious Harry Truman National Scholarship in Public Service. She has held a number of volunteer leadership positions for the American Red Cross, and has served on the governing boards and in a variety of advisory roles for several local and national non-profit organizations.

» Collapse

Henry Claypool – Consultant

Henry Claypool is the former Director of the Health and Human Services Office on Disability and a founding Principal Deputy Administrator of the Administration for Community Living. He also served as a presidentially-appointed member of the Federal Commission on Long-Term Care, advising Congress on how long-term care can be better provided and financed for the nation’s older adults and people with disabilities, now and in the future, and was Executive Vice President of the American Association of People with Disabilities, which promotes equal opportunity, economic power, independent living and political participation for people with disabilities. He is Affiliated Faculty at the Institute for Health & Aging at UCSF and principal of Claypool Consulting.