Joseph G. Ouslander, M.D. (Project Director) - Dr. Ouslander is Professor and Associate Dean for Geriatric Programs at the Charles E. Schmidt College of Medicine, and Professor at the Christine E. Lynn College of Nursing of Florida Atlantic University in Boca Raton Florida. Dr. Ouslander served as a Professor at UCLA for 15 years developing research, educational, and clinical programs. From 1996-2007 he served as the Director of Geriatric Medicine at Emory University. He is a past-President and Board Chair of the American Geriatrics Society, and serves as the Executive Editor of the society's Journal. He is a co-author of Essentials of Clinical Geriatrics and Medical Care in the Nursing Home, and an editor of Hazzard's Geriatric Medicine and Gerontology. 

Gerri Lamb, Ph.D., R.N., F.A.A.N. (Project Co-director) – Dr. Lamb is an Associate Professor at the Arizona State University College of Nursing and Health Innovation and a Visiting Scholar at Emory University. She is nationally recognized for her research and publications on care coordination, nurse case management, and continuum-based outcomes. Dr. Lamb has several funded projects on nurse care coordination activities in the hospital, and is very active in national quality and safety initiatives.  She co-chairs the National Quality Forum’s Steering Committee on care coordination, is a member of the Physician Consortium for Quality Improvement (PCPI) Measurement Advisory Committee, chairs the American Academy of Nursing Expert Panel on Quality, and is vice-chair of the board of the newly convened Nursing Alliance for Quality Care.

Laurie Herndon, G.N.P. (Senior Project Coordinator) - Laurie Herndon is a Gerontological Nurse Practitioner at Fallon Clinic in Worcester, MA, and the Director for Clinical Quality at Massachusetts Senior Care Foundation. She has worked as a project consultant for a number of New England Quality Improvement Organizations on topics including depression, falls, and medication management. She also holds a clinical faculty position at the University of Massachusetts Graduate School of Nursing in Worcester, where she served as the project coordinator for CoGEMS:  Comprehensive Geriatric Education and Mentoring Across Settings.

Ruth Tappen, Ed.D., F.A.A.N. (Project Collaborator) - is a Distinguished Professor of Nursing at the Christine E. Lynn College of Nursing of Florida Atlantic University. She is a nationally known scholar and researcher in aging, and  has been funded by NIH, HRSA, AoA, major foundations, and others. She served as FAU’s acting V.P. of Research for two years and was the founder of the Memory and Wellness Center, a state designated memory disorder center. Her research has addressed a range of issues related to aging with emphasis on exercise, communication and cognitive retraining therapies. Her forthcoming book Advanced Nursing Research: From Theory to Practice reflects her expertise in research design analysis and psychometric evaluation.

Alice Bonner, Ph.D., R.N. (Project Collaborator) – Dr. Bonner has been a geriatric nurse practitioner for the past 20 years. From 1997-2005 she was the Clinical Director of Long Term Care and Geriatrics at the Fallon Clinic in Worcester, Massachusetts. From 2005-2009, Dr. Bonner was Executive Director at the Massachusetts Senior Care Foundation, an organization that works to improve the lives of older adults and persons with disabilities through research, education and quality improvement. She also served as an Assistant Professor at the Graduate School of Nursing, University of Massachusetts in Worcester, MA. and Director of the Bureau of Health Care Safety and Quality at the Massachusetts Department of Public Health in Boston, MA. Currently  Dr. Bonner is the Director of the Nursing Home Division in the Survey and Certification Group at The Center for Medicare & Medicaid Services. 

Mary Perloe RN, MS, GNP-BC (Project Collaborator) - Mary Perloe manages the CMS Care Transitions Initiative at GMCF, Georgia’s Medicare Quality Improvement Organization. She coordinated the initial INTERACT project and assisted in the development of the first version of the INTERACT tools. She has directed a Long Term Care Person Centered Care collaborative and served as a Patient Safety consultant.  Before joining the QIO she provided Geriatric primary care in physician offices, clinics and nursing homes.

Sanya Diaz, M.D. (Project Assistant) – Dr. Diaz received her Medical Doctor degree in 2002 from Universidad Mayor de San Andres in La Paz-Bolivia. Currently she is a Research Associate for the Charles E. Schmidt College of Medicine at Florida Atlantic University where she assists with the quality improvement and research activities in the Safe Transitions for Elderly People (STEP) program and the South Florida Quality Aging Registry, in addition to being responsible for the INTERACTII database administration.