Our Professional Staff
Allen Dobson, Ph.D., is a health economist and President and CEO of Dobson | DaVanzo & Associates, LLC (Dobson | DaVanzo). Before he co-founded the firm in May 2007, Dr. Dobson spent eighteen years with The Lewin Group where he was Senior Vice President and directed the Health Care Finance Group. In this position, Dr. Dobson led numerous, large-scale studies for both Federal and private-sector clients. Prior to The Lewin Group, Dr. Dobson served as Director in the Office of Research at CMS (formerly the Health Care Financing Administration) when the Medicare Inpatient Prospective Payment System (PPS) and the Medicare Physician Fee Schedule (PFS) were being formulated and implemented.
Dr. Dobson has expertise evaluating Medicare’s various PPS policies (e.g., acute care hospitals, long term care hospitals, skilled nursing facilities, inpatient rehabilitation facilities, home health agencies, and ambulatory surgery centers), and, over the last twenty-five years, has directed numerous efforts to model the economic impact of Medicare and Medicaid payment policies on providers using a variety of statistical and econometric methodologies. For 10 years, Dr. Dobson also advised CMS on the development of methodologies to determine physician practice expenses, and, more recently, on the calculation of Medicare Disproportionate Share Hospital (DSH) policy for CMS and Medicaid DSH policy for MACPAC.
Dr. Dobson currently co-leads Dobson | DaVanzo’s research modeling activities for bundled payments, value-based purchasing, and alternative payment model (APM) systems. Here, Dobson | DaVanzo provides essential information to a number of stakeholders as they implement CMS’ Bundled Payment for Care Improvement (BPCI) Initiative, and, more recently, CMS’ Comprehensive Care for Joint Replacement (CJR) and Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act of 2015 (MACRA). Dr. Dobson also directs numerous private-sector research efforts on APM using linked Medicare research identifiable datasets through CMS-approved data use agreements (DUAs). Findings from many of these studies have been reported to CMS, the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission (MedPAC), the Medicaid and CHIP Payment and Access Commission (MACPAC), the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), and various other Congressional committees. Dr. Dobson also leads a series of efforts to assist clients’ responses to CMS requests for public comment on rulemaking.
Dr. Dobson was selected as one of the nation's most influential health care policy leaders by Faulkner and Gray, selecting him in their first edition of "The Health Care 500." Dr. Dobson is a regular speaker at conferences and has testified before the Congress, MedPAC, and various state, federal, and presidential commissions on health care finance, provider payment, and health policy issues. Over the years, he has testified before Pennsylvania, Illinois, Mississippi, Maine, and Nevada state legislatures. His work has been widely published in peer-reviewed journals, such as The New England Journal of Medicine, Journal of the American Medical Association, Inquiry, Journal of Managed Care, Health Affairs, Military Medicine (International Journal of the Association of Military Surgeons of the United States), Seminars in Dialysis, The Milbank Quarterly, and Health Care Financing Review.
Dr. Dobson is a Phi Beta Kappa graduate from the University of Washington in Seattle, and earned his Ph.D. in Economics from Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri.