Harvard Catalyst Profiles

Contact, publication, and social network information about Harvard faculty and fellows.

Robert J. Blendon, D.Sc.

Title
Institution
Department
Address
Phone
Profile Picture

Biography
The Johns Hopkins University School of Public HealthSc.D.1969

Overview
Research

Dr. Robert J. Blendon is currently the Richard L. Menschel Professor of Public Health and Professor of Health Policy and Political Analysis, Emeritus, at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. He holds appointments as a Professor of Health Policy and Political Analysis at both the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and the Harvard Kennedy School of Government. In addition, he directs the Harvard Opinion Research Program, which focuses on better understanding of public knowledge, attitudes, and beliefs about major social policy issues in the U.S. and other nations. He currently co-directs the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation/Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health project on understanding Americans' Health Agenda, including a joint series with National Public Radio and POLITICO. Previously, he co-directed a special polling series with the Washington Post and Kaiser Family Foundation, which was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize. Additionally, Dr. Blendon co-directed a special survey project for the Minneapolis Star Tribune on health care that received the National Press Club's 1998 Award for Consumer Journalism. He also co-directed a project for National Public Radio and the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation on American attitudes toward domestic policy. The series was cited by the National Journal as setting a new standard for use of public opinion surveys in broadcast journalism.

Between 1987 and 1996 he served as Chairman of the Department of Health Policy and Management at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and as Deputy Director of the Harvard University Division of Health Policy Research and Education. Prior to his Harvard appointment, Dr. Blendon was senior vice-president at The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. In addition, he has served as a senior faculty member for the U.S. Conference of Mayors, the National Governor's Association, and the U.S. Congress Committee on Ways and Means.

Dr. Blendon teaches courses on both Political Strategy in Health Policy and Public Opinion Polling at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government and the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. He also directs the Political Analysis track in the University's Ph.D. Program in Health Policy.

Dr. Blendon is a member of the Institute of Medicine, of the National Academy of Sciences and of the Council of Foreign Relations, a former member of the advisory board to the Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and a former member of the editorial board of the Journal of the American Medical Association. He is also a Past President of the Association of Health Services Research and winner of their Distinguished Investigator Award. He is also a recipient of the Baxter Award for lifetime achievement in the health services research field. He has also received the John M. Eisenberg Excellence in Mentorship Award from the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) and the Mendelsohn award from Harvard University. In 2008, he was the recipient of the Warren J. Mitofsky Award for Excellence in Public Opinion Research given by the Roper Center.

He is a graduate of Marietta College. He is also a graduate of the School of Business at the University of Chicago, with a Masters in Business Administration. In addition, he holds a Doctoral degree from the School of Public Health of Johns Hopkins University, where his principal attention was directed toward health policy.

Research
The research activities and funding listed below are automatically derived from NIH ExPORTER and other sources, which might result in incorrect or missing items. Faculty can login to make corrections and additions.
  1. R03HS006379 (BLENDON, ROBERT J) Sep 1, 1989 - Aug 31, 1991
    NIH
    DISCRIMINATORY ATTITUDES AND KNOWLEDGE ABOUT AIDS
    Role: Principal Investigator

Bibliographic
Publications listed below are automatically derived from MEDLINE/PubMed and other sources, which might result in incorrect or missing publications. Faculty can login to make corrections and additions.
Newest   |   Oldest   |   Most Cited   |   Most Discussed   |   Timeline   |   Field Summary   |   Plain Text
PMC Citations indicate the number of times the publication was cited by articles in PubMed Central, and the Altmetric score represents citations in news articles and social media. (Note that publications are often cited in additional ways that are not shown here.) Fields are based on how the National Library of Medicine (NLM) classifies the publication's journal and might not represent the specific topic of the publication. Translation tags are based on the publication type and the MeSH terms NLM assigns to the publication. Some publications (especially newer ones and publications not in PubMed) might not yet be assigned Field or Translation tags.) Click a Field or Translation tag to filter the publications.
Updating...
This operation might take several minutes to complete. Please do not close your browser.
Local representatives can answer questions about the Profiles website or help with editing a profile or issues with profile data. For assistance with this profile: SPH faculty should contact Faculty Affairs at facultyaffairs@hsph.harvard.edu.
Blendon's Networks
Click the
Explore
buttons for more information and interactive visualizations!
Concepts (503)
Explore
_
Co-Authors (34)
Explore
_
Similar People (60)
Explore
_
Same Department 
Explore
_
Physical Neighbors
_
Funded by the NIH National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences through its Clinical and Translational Science Awards Program, grant number UL1TR002541.