Dr. Carolyn M. Clancy has served as director of the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality since February 2003. Clancy, a general internist and health services researcher, is a graduate of Boston College and the University of Massachusetts Medical School. Following clinical training in internal medicine, Clancy was a Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation Fellow at the University of Pennsylvania. She was also an assistant professor in the Department of Internal Medicine at the Medical College of Virginia in Richmond before joining AHRQ in 1990. In addition, Clancy served as chairwoman of Physicians for a National Health Program.
Clancy served as director of AHRQ’s Center for Outcomes and Effectiveness Research and later as the agency’s acting director from March 2002 until taking over permanently in 2003.
Clancy holds an academic appointment at George Washington University School of Medicine (clinical associate professor, Department of Medicine) and serves as senior associate editor for Health Services Research. Clancy has served on multiple editorial boards (currently Annals of Family Medicine, American Journal of Medical Quality and Medical Care Research and Review). She has published in peer reviewed journals and has edited or contributed to seven books. She is a member of the Institute of Medicine and was elected a Master of the American College of Physicians in 2004.
Clancy’s major research interests include various dimensions of health care quality and patient, including women’s health, primary care, access to care services and the impact of financial incentives on physicians’ decisions.