Sue Palsbo, PhD
Research Professor

Unit: Department of Global and Community Health
Phone: 541-505-7591
Fax: 541-505-7591*51
Email: spalsbo@gmu.edu

Dr. Palsbo is a Principal Research Associate at George Mason University’s Center for the Study of Chronic Illness and Disability.  She has worked in the fields of managed care and vulnerable populations (disabled and elderly) for 20 years as an employee of several health maintenance organizations (HMOs), and as an external researcher.  As an HMO employee, she manipulated large data sets of proprietary claims and membership information to inform strategic business and clinical decision-making on a wide variety of topics including benefit packages and premiums, as well as preparing HEDIS® quality measure submissions to maintain state licensure.  She gained a national public health policy perspective through frequent interactions with federal health agencies on Medicare capitation, quality measurement, and HMO regulations.  Seeking to further her credentials as an independent investigator, she moved in1999 to the Center for Health and Disability Research, located at National Rehabilitation Hospital, and served as its Director for two years.  In 2005, she joined the research faculty at George Mason University. 
Since 1999, she has initiated over $2 million of extramurally-funded seminal research to improve access to care for people with disabilities, using two strategies:  health system redesign/evaluation, and tele-rehabilitation.

Recent publications:

Palsbo SE, Sutton C, Mastal MF, Johnson S, Cohen A.  2008.  Identifyingand Classifying People with Disabilities Using Claims Data:  Further Development of the Access Risk Classification System (ARCS) Algorithm.  Disability and Health Journal. 1(4):215-223 (October).

Palsbo SE and Ho, PS.  2007.  Consumer Evaluation of a Disability-Care Coordination Organization. Journal of Healthcare for the Poor and Under served  18(4):887-901.  (November). 

Palsbo SE, Dawson SJ, Savard L, Goldstein M, Heuser A. 2007. Tele-assessmentusing functional reach and the European Stroke Scale J. Rehabilitation Research and Development 44(5):659-664.

Palsbo SE and Kroll T. 2007 Meeting information needs to facilitate decision making: report cards for people with disabilities. Health Expectations10(3), 278–285. (September) .

Nelson E and Palsbo SE. 2006. Methodological Challenges in Equivalence Studies at Specialty Telemedicine Clinics. Evaluation and Program Planning29(4):419-424. (November)

Palsbo SE, Mastal MF, O’Donnell L. 2006. Disability Care Coordination Organizations. Lippincott’s Case Management 11(5):255-264. (September/October).

Palsbo, SE. Tele-Assessment of Functional Communication. 2007. Journal of Telemedicine and Telecare 13:40–43.

Palsbo SE and Kailes JI.  2006. Disability-Competent Health Systems (pdf).  Disability Studies Quarterly Spring. 26(2): www.dsq-sds.org  (internet publication)

McCue M and Palsbo, SE.  2006. Making the business case for telemedicine:an interactive spreadsheet. Telemedicine and e-Health 12(2):19-26.

Educational Background and Awards:

• Ph.D., Health Services Research, George Washington University, 1992
• Public Health Service Traineeship, 1984
• M.S., Marine Resource Management, Texas A&M University, 1977
• Texas A&M University Marine Fellow, 1976-1977
• B.A. with Honors, Marine Biology, Occidental College, 1975