LaShawn Worsley-McIver, M.D., M.P.H., is the Director of the Office of Minority Health at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS). CMS provides healthcare to over 130 million Americans every year, with a $1.3 trillion budget that makes up 26% of the entire federal budget. She serves as the agency focal point and senior technical advisor and authority within CMS on all matters related to minority health. As a physician, public health professional and government affairs expert with more than 16 years of experience, Dr. Worsley-McIver is a proven public health leader knowledgeable in driving successful health initiatives and public policy efforts aimed at improving health outcomes, promoting health equity, increasing access to care, health system reform and international health.
For over nine years, Dr. Worsley-McIver led Government Affairs & Advocacy (GA&A) efforts at the American Diabetes Association (ADA) as its Vice President of Public Policy & Strategic Alliances and later as its Senior Vice President of all GA&A. As its principal advocacy executive, Dr. Worsley-McIver successfully provided strategic direction and oversight of the ADA’s advocacy activities, which focused on increasing federal and state funding for diabetes research and programs; preventing diabetes; improving the availability of accessible, adequate, and affordable health care; eliminating diabetes disparities and discrimination against people with diabetes at school, work, and elsewhere in their lives.
Dr. Worsley-McIver is a recognized spokesperson and thought leader on health disparities, healthcare reform, and diabetes advocacy issues, having appeared on global media outlets including CNN, MSNBC, CBS, NBC, NPR, and Al Jazeera. She is a frequent presenter before Members of Congress, public health and health care leaders, advocates and students.
Dr. Worsley-McIver completed her capstone global health clerkship in Kenya and graduated from MSIH in 2004. She went on to earn a Master’s Degree in public health at John Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Her community-based course work and experiences as a program director for the Baltimore City Health Department inspired her to advocate for health equity among diverse patient populations, and she later completed a health policy fellowship focusing on the impact of HIV and AIDS on African-Americans at the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation’s Center for Policy Analysis and Research.