STARS Team
Christopher Moriates MD
Executive Director
Dr. Chris Moriates is the Executive Director for Costs of Care. He is also the Chief of Hospital Medicine for the VA Greater Los Angeles Healthcare System, and a Full Professor of Clinical Medicine at UCLA. He previously served as the Assistant Dean for Healthcare Value, Associate Chair for Quality, Safety, and Value, and an Associate Professor at Dell Medical School at The University of Texas at Austin. Dr. Moriates led the creation of the UCSF Cost Awareness Curriculum, the Dell Med Discovering Value-Based Health Care Interactive Learning Modules, and the U.S STARS Program. He co authored the book Understanding Value Based Healthcare (McGraw-Hill, 2015) and has published more than 75 peer-reviewed articles.
Bryana Banashefski, MS4
National Resource Development Lead
Bryana Banashefski is an MD
student at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York City. Bryana joined
Mount Sinai’s Student High Value Care Initiative as a Student Lead during her first year
of medical school. Through this initiative, she was connected with the STARS program
and participated in the Choosing Wisely STARS Program in 2021, allowing her to
connect with like-minded medical students nationally. Through connections made at the
STARS conference, Bryana began developing quality improvement tools and resources
focused on empowering students to implement high value care initiatives at their
schools. These projects ultimately led her to take on the role of STARS National
Resource Development Lead. Bryana has participated in two Choosing Wisely panel
discussions and enjoys speaking with younger students interested in incorporating
quality improvement into their careers.
Benjamin Dralle, MD
Resident Physician Advisor
Benjamin Dralle is an MD student at The Ohio State University College of Medicine. He participated in the Choosing Wisely STARS program in 2020 and joined the Costs of Care team in January 2021 as the Social Media Manager. Mr. Dralle’s teaching and research efforts are focused on high value care education for pre-clinical medical students, as well as the utilization of social media platforms for promoting high value care and affordability initiatives. He previously led a high value care Twitter chat for medical students and other health professionals, and he currently serves as a peer coach for Ohio State medical students participating in the STARS program.
September Wallingford RN, MSN
Deputy Director
Ms. Wallingford is the Deputy Director for Costs of Care. She leads and supports multiple grants and subcontracts from various organizations, as well as develops partnerships with leading healthcare organizations such as The Leapfrog Group, Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI), and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. Ms. Wallingford is a practicing medical/surgical oncology nurse at a large academic medical center in Boston, Massachusetts, and has brought significant interprofessional insights to the Costs of Care team.
STARS Advisory Board
Anne Linker, MD
Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai Hospital
Dr. Linker is an Assistant Professor of Medicine at Mount Sinai Hospital, in the Division of Hospital Medicine. She received her bachelor’s degree in History from Cornell University, and her medical degree from Weill Cornell Medical College. She completed her residency in Internal Medicine at the University of California San Francisco (UCSF) where she was part of the Health Systems Leadership Pathway.
Dr. Linker’s academic work centers on process improvement, including quality improvement, high value care, transitions of care, provider wellbeing, and clinical reasoning. She serves in several roles for DHM, including the Associate Director of Quality for the Division of Hospital Medicine, co-director of the Student High Value Care Curriculum, and associate director of the Healthcare Leadership Track (HLT) for the Internal Medicine Residency at Mount Sinai. She has led numerous projects to improve the value and quality of care provided at Mount Sinai Hospital, including grant-funded initiatives. She serves on the national Society of Hospital Medicine Physicians-In-Training Committee. Her work has been published in JAMA Internal Medicine, Journal of General Internal Medicine, and The Hospitalist.
William Silverstein MD, MSc
Choosing Wisely Canada STARS, University of Toronto
Dr. Silverstein is a General Internist at Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre and an Assistant Professor (Clinician in Quality and Innovation) at the University of Toronto. Dr. Silverstein completed his medical school, internal medicine, and General Internal Medicine training at the University of Toronto, where he also served as Sunnybrook’s Chief Medical Resident. He has completed a Master of Science degree with a concentration in Quality Improvement and Patient Safety at the University of Toronto, an Editorial Fellowship at JAMA Internal Medicine, and a Healthcare Improvement Fellowship through Choosing Wisely Canada and the Centre for Quality Improvement and Patient Safety. He is currently an Editor of the JAMA Internal Medicine Teachable Moments Series, the Chair of the Canadian Society of Internal Medicine’s Choosing Wisely Committee, and is the Lead of Choosing Wisely Canada. His academic interests including implementing initiatives to reduce provision of low-value care, using health system databases to identify areas of low-value care; and leading educational programs to educate trainees and clinicians on how to incorporate high-value care into their practices.
Richard M. Wardrop III, MD, PhD
Cleveland Clinic Lerner College of Medicine at Case Western Reserve University
Dr. Wardrop is a career clinician-educator and is the Program Director for the Internal Medicine Residency Program and Vice Chair of the Academic Department of Medicine at The Cleveland Clinic Foundation in Cleveland, OH. He serves as faculty at the Cleveland Clinic Lerner College of Medicine and Case Western Reserve University and Northeastern Ohio Medical University where he holds the rank of Professor.
Dr. Wardrop has served in national leadership positions within the ACP, the Alliance for Academic Internal Medicine (AAIM), the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) and the American Board of Internal Medicine (ABIM). He recently finished his service as Chair of the Council of Early Career Physicians and as a member of the ACP Board of Regents. Within AAIM, has served on the AAIM Education Committee, served on the AAIM Graduate Medical Education Funding Task force and chaired the AAIM Faculty Development Committee from 2015-2017. Within the AAP, Richard Dr. Wardrop has been a member of the Section of Medicine and Pediatrics Executive Council from 2015-2018. Dr. Wardrop currently is serving his second term as a member of the ABIM Internal Medicine Board and will assume the role of Chair in July 2024 for an initial 3 year term. He has been active in the High Value Care educational space as a members of the STARS Program at UNC and UMMC and is a founding member of the High Value Practice Alliance.
Nina Gu, MS4
University of Virginia School of Medicine
Nina Gu is a fourth year medical student at University of Virginia School of Medicine. After learning about high value care and the Choosing Wisely STARS program from UVA’s annual Primary Care Week, she became a UVA 2022 STARS representative. She has since helped execute a national multi-center study of medical student experiences, anticipated specialty, and HVC attitudes, and is currently spearheading local projects and initiatives with the rest of the UVA STARS team. Nina is applying to Family Medicine — she sees HVC as a perfect complement to her passion for reducing medical costs from the individual to societal level, as well as promoting healthy communities and patient-centered care.
Kathleen Mulligan, MS3
Frank H. Netter, MD School of Medicine at Quinnipiac University
Kathleen is a medical student at the Frank H. Netter MD School of Medicine at Quinnipiac University. Prior to medical school, Kathleen studied individual and organizational drivers of low-value care as a research assistant at Brigham and Women’s Hospital. In this role, Kathleen coauthored multiple peer-reviewed articles on the use and consequences of low-value care. Kathleen continued her work in the value-based care space by participating in the Choosing Wisely STARS program as a first-year medical student in 2023. She will be serving on both the STARS Advisory Board and the STARS Clerkship Task Force over the 2024–2025 academic year and is passionate about finding ways to effectively teach high–value care principles in medical education. Kathleen received her BA from Dartmouth College, where she studied biology and education.
Vincent Ooi, MS2
William Carey University
Vincent was born in Honolulu, Hawaii and is currently a William Carey University medical student and a UC Berkeley alumni who graduated with Honors in Molecular and Cellular Biology and a double minor in Education and Global Poverty & Practice. Vincent’s career goal is to become a surgeon in private practice, either in Orthopedics or Ophthalmology, after medical school and residency. His part time activities are performing clinical work, participating in research, and conducting his own project in a startup company that features free online education for low income individuals in underdeveloped areas. Vincent is passionate about non-profit work, as well as committing to actions on poverty and tackling social injustices.
Jordan Pemberton, MS2
Baylor College of Medicine
Jordan is an MS2 at Baylor College of Medicine. He was born in Ridgewood, New Jersey, and moved to Houston Texas at 3. He is an alumnus of the University of Houston Honors College, where he received his Bachelor of Science in Health with a minor in Biology. Currently, he serves as the Vice Chair for the AMA’s Medical Student Section (MSS) Committee on Economics and Quality in Medicine (CEQM), as well as the Chair for the local AMA/TMA chapter at his medical school. He is also an active STARS student on his campus, where he assists in running the Dean’s Distinction for High-Value Care. Before medical school, Jordan served as an intern for multiple years at the University of Pennsylvania and MD Anderson Cancer Center, where he received awards for his work on metastatic melanoma and malignant peripheral nerve sheath tumors (MPNSTs), respectively. In 2020, he was also honored with serving as the Grand Marshal for the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo. During his time in medical school, Jordan has developed an interest in improving healthcare and health systems from a macro level, which has led him to his current positions with STARS and the AMA. As he continues through his medical training, he plans to continue to seek knowledge and gain expertise on ways to transform the delivery of healthcare in America, particularly through medical and patient education, quality improvement, and high-value care principles.
Gary Wang, fifth-year MD/MBA
University of Chicago
Gary is a fifth-year MD/MBA student at the University of Chicago and student member of the STARS Advisory Board. He previously served as STARS Representative for the Pritzker School of Medicine where he co-led work creating badge cards for medical students to learn high-value care principles and hosting community-facing events to promote patient self-advocacy. His professional and research interests focus on care delivery and payment transformation, population health, and access to care for marginalized populations. He is applying into Internal Medicine with the goal of becoming a general internist. Gary received his B.S. in Neuroscience and Health Policy from Duke University.
Clerkship Task Force Members
Hannah Bassett, MD - Pediatric Hospitalist
Co-Chair and Costs of Care Director
Stanford University
Dr. Hannah Bassett is a Clinical Assistant Professor at Stanford University School of Medicine and a pediatric hospitalist at Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital (LPCH). She is the co-director of the Packard Clinical Pathway Program and the Physician Lead for Acute Care in the Clinical Effectiveness Program at LPCH. Her institutional work focuses on decreasing unnecessary variation in clinical care, promoting high value care at the bedside, and making it easier for clinical teams to “do the right thing, for the right patient, at the right time.” Her research focuses on patient- and family-centered healthcare cost transparency and better understanding the financial impact of acute care.
Allison Heacock, MD - Pediatric Hospitalist
Co-Chair and Faculty Mentor
The Ohio State University
Allison Heacock, MD, is an assistant professor of clinical internal medicine and pediatrics in the section of Hospital Pediatrics. When not providing hospital based pediatrics and adult care, she focuses on improving the quality, patient safety and resources utilization in the health systems for which she works. Dr. Heacock oversees the systems based practice education to the medical students at Ohio State University. Lastly, she is passionate about caring for patients admitted with failure to thrive and serves as a physician lead for the Failure to Thrive Pathway.
Nina Gu, MS4
University of Virginia School of Medicine
Nina Gu is a fourth year medical student at University of Virginia School of Medicine. After learning about high value care and the Choosing Wisely STARS program from UVA’s annual Primary Care Week, she became a UVA 2022 STARS representative. She has since helped execute a national multi-center study of medical student experiences, anticipated specialty, and HVC attitudes, and is currently spearheading local projects and initiatives with the rest of the UVA STARS team. Nina is applying to Family Medicine — she sees HVC as a perfect complement to her passion for reducing medical costs from the individual to societal level, as well as promoting healthy communities and patient-centered care.
Shivani Jain, MS4 - Member
LSU Health Sciences Center - New Orleans
Shivani Jain is completing her M.D. training at LSUHSC-NO SOM and has previously completed graduate training in medical genetics, epidemiology, and global health. She has served as her medical school’s STARS Fellow, completing projects to evaluate the implementation of Choosing Wisely guidelines at hospitals across greater New Orleans and to improve health literacy at the point of care. In addition, Shivani had been working with STARS Fellows at Dell Medical School to author a case for the “Anatomy of A Medical Bill” project. She is involved with honors research, a Latinx scholars program, the honors council, the interprofessional education scholars program, the Albert Schweitzer Fellowship, and various health advocacy and service organizations at her school as well as in her community. She is passionate about improving high-value care, transparency in medicine, and sustainable design in health care systems.
Anitra Karthic, MS4
The Ohio State University
Anitra is a third year medical student at The Ohio State University College of Medicine. Her interest in
high value care increased greatly through her involvement in the Choosing Wisely STARS program.
Working with her cohort to implement HVC into their school’s curriculum helped her understand the
vital role that HVC plays in medical education. Students are curious about our healthcare system and
hungry to learn more! This motivated her to join the Clerkship Task Force to help expand learning opportunities. She firmly believes that incorporating HVC principles into clinical clerkships is important
for nurturing well-rounded and compassionate physicians who can make informed decisions for the benefit of their patients.
Olivia Korostoff-Larsson, MS4
NYU Grossman School of Medicine
Olivia is a current fourth-year medical student at NYU. She grew up in Massachusetts and graduated from Barnard College, where she studied biology and anthropology. As a first-year medical student, Olivia became involved in the Costs of Care STARS program and led NYU’s High Value Care Club, working to promote value-based care within the medical school. She is also engaged in quality improvement and health systems research as part of the Rapid RCT Lab at NYU’s Center for Healthcare Innovation and Delivery Science. Olivia is excited to join the STARS Clerkship Taskforce and to help think about creative strategies to integrate high value care into medical education.
Hannah Shenton, MS4
The Ohio State University
Hannah is a 4th year medical student at The Ohio State University College of Medicine interested in family medicine. At her institution, she has developed and implemented a longitudinal high-value care curriculum disseminated to all pre-clinical students during weekly doctoring courses. Since this project, she has stayed on as a mentor to the new STARS and have been involved in the STARS Clerkship Task Force for the past year. Hannah’s current interests in high-value care include medical education and preventative medicine to reduce potential costs. Outside of medicine, she loves spending time with her partner, family, friends, and pets, being active as a yogi and runner, gardening, reading, and volunteering.
Selina Chang, MS3
University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine
Selina is a MS3 at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. She previously served as a student project manager for the HVPA National Conference, where she was inspired by others dedicated to promoting value in healthcare. She is excited to participate in the STARS Clerkship Task Force to identify methods to better serve patients and their families.
Kathleen Mulligan, MS3
Frank H. Netter, MD School of Medicine at Quinnipiac University
Kathleen is a medical student at the Frank H. Netter MD School of Medicine at Quinnipiac University. Prior to medical school, Kathleen studied individual and organizational drivers of low-value care as a research assistant at Brigham and Women’s Hospital. In this role, Kathleen coauthored multiple peer-reviewed articles on the use and consequences of low-value care. Kathleen continued her work in the value-based care space by participating in the Choosing Wisely STARS program as a first-year medical student in 2023. She will be serving on both the STARS Advisory Board and the STARS Clerkship Task Force over the 2024–2025 academic year and is passionate about finding ways to effectively teach high–value care principles in medical education. Kathleen received her BA from Dartmouth College, where she studied biology and education.
Katie Perry, MS3
Wright State University Boonshoft School of Medicine
Katie is an M3 at Wright State University Boonshoft School of Medicine in Dayton, Ohio. She is currently interested in primary care, but still trying to decide between Pediatrics and Family Medicine. Throughout her clerkships so far, she has learned that she loves focusing on lifestyle medicine, health literacy/social determinants of health, and mental health. In her free time, Katie enjoys running, reading, and crafts, and is excited to be a part of the Clerkship Taskforce in order to better prepare medical students to walk their patients through high value care decisions.