Gail R. Wilensky, PhD

Gail Wilensky, PhD, was appointed to the Geisinger Health Board of Directors in September 2010. Dr. Wilensky is chair of the Governance Committee and also serves on the Quality Committee of the board.

Dr. Wilensky is an economist and a senior fellow at Project HOPE, an international health foundation. She serves as a trustee of the Combined Benefits Fund of the United Mine Workers of America and the National Opinion Research Center and is on the board of regents of the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences. Dr. Wilensky served as president of the Defense Health Board, a federal advisory board to the Secretary of Defense, was a commissioner on the World Health Organization’s Commission on the Social Determinants of Health and co-chaired the Department of Defense Task Force on the Future of Military Health Care.

She was the administrator of the Health Care Financing Administration (now called CMS) from 1990 to 1992 and the deputy assistant for policy development to President George H. W. Bush in 1992. Dr. Wilensky chaired the Physician Payment Review Commission from 1995 to 1997 and MedPAC from 1997 to 2001. She is an elected member of the Institute of Medicine and has served two terms on its governing council.

A former chair of the board of directors of Academy Health, a former trustee of the American Heart Association and a current or former director of numerous other non-profit organizations, Dr. Wilensky is also a director of UnitedHealth Group, Quest Diagnostics and BrainScope.

Dr. Wilensky testifies frequently before Congressional committees, serves as an advisor to members of Congress and other elected officials, and speaks nationally and internationally. She earned a Bachelor of Psychology and a PhD in economics at the University of Michigan and has also received several honorary degrees.

Dr. Wilensky resides with her husband Robert in Washington, D.C.