Kenneth W. Kizer.

Kenneth W. Kizer, MD, MPH, CPE, FACPE, is the recipient of the 2005 Ernest Amory Codman Award from The Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations for his leadership role in using performance measures to improve health care quality and safety. Kizer is a passionate advocate for performance improvement, the public reporting of performance and using measurement as a means to improve the quality of health care. He is the president and chief executive officer of the National Quality Forum, leading national efforts to establish consensus-based standards for measurement and public reporting of health care performance information that will be meaningful in making determinations about safety and quality. Named for the physician regarded in health care as the "father of outcomes measurement," the Ernest Amory Codman Award showcases the effective use of performance measurement by health care organizations to improve the quality and safety of health care. A panel of national experts in quality measurement and improvement selected the recipients of the 2005 awards, As the Under Secretary for Health in the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) from 1994 to 1999, Kizer was the highest ranking physician in the federal government and the chief executive officer of the veterans health care system, where he transformed the manner in which care is delivered and measured in the VA. The VA maintains the largest integrated health care system in the nation, with a budget of more than $20 billion, approximately 200,000 staff and more than 1,100 sites of care delivery. Today, the VA is recognized as a model of excellence in health care due to Kizer's leadership and aggressive goals for improvement. Kizer serves on numerous national and international advisory boards and panels, and he sits on the governing boards of a number of organizations and institutions. He is an honors graduate of Stanford University and UCLA. He is board certified in six medical specialties or subspecialties and has authored more than 400 original articles, book chapters and other reports in medical literature.

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