Michelle Mello

Director, Program in Law and Public Health; Chair, HSPH Institutional Review Board

Dr. Mello conducts empirical research into issues at the intersection of law, ethics, and health policy. She is the author of more than 100 articles and book chapters on the medical malpractice system, medical errors and patient safety, research ethics, the obesity epidemic, pharmaceuticals, clinical ethics, and other topics. Dr. Mello is currently studying legal and ethical issues concerning the pharmaceutical industry as a Greenwall Faculty Scholar and is the recipient of a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) Investigator Award in Health Policy Research to study disclosure and compensation of medical injuries. She serves as a Key Consultant to the National Program Office of RWJF's program in Public Health Law Research and a member of the Institute of Medicine's Committee on Drug Safety and Post-Marketing Requirements. In 2006, she received the Alice S. Hersh New Investigator Award from AcademyHealth for exceptional promise for contributions to the field of health services research.

Design of a Reliable System of Medical Justice 

The goal of this study is to provide research to support demonstration projects of an administrative compensation system for medical injury, called "health courts". The project is investigating issues such as compensation criteria, costs, appropriate damages, constitutionality, and relationship of the system to patient safety.  More

State Policy Approaches to Foster Uptake of the Human Papillomavirus Vaccine

The major goal of this project is to study the legal and policy approaches that states are taking to fostering uptake of the HPV vaccine. The project will identify policy "best practices" and analyze HPV vaccination as a case example of the use of laws and policies to promote public health.  More

Ethical Issues in the Pharmaceutical Industry

This project is examining a series of legal and ethical challenges confronting the pharmaceutical industry, including issues of drug safety, disclosure of clinical trial data,  and relationships with academic researchers.  More

Responding Justly to Patients Injured by Medical Care 

This project is examining how policy levers such as mandatory disclosure laws and laws protecting apologies from use in malpractice litigation are affecting the practice of disclosing medical errors and injuries to patients.  It is also evaluating several innovative institutional programs that couple disclosures with offers of compensation.  More

Board of Directors, AcademyHealth
Key Consultant, National Program Office for Public Health Law Research Program, Robert Wood Johnson Foundation

Advisory Board on Publication Ethics, PLoS Medicine
Links with Academia Advisory Committee, American Health Lawyers Association

Alice S. Hersh New Investigator Award, AcademyHealth
Greenwall Faculty Scholar
Citations for Excellence in Teaching, Harvard School of Public Health

Public Health Law
Ethical Basis of the Practice of Public Health

J.D., 2000, Yale Law School
Ph.D., 1999, Health Policy and Administration, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
M.Phil., 1995, Comparative Social Research, Oxford University
B.A., 1993, Political Science and Applied Ethics, Stanford University

Mello MM, Clarridge BR, Studdert DM.  Academic medical centers' standards for clinical-trial agreements with industry. N Engl J Med 2005;352:2202-2210.  Read it

Mello MM, Brennan TA. Deterrence of medical errors: theory and evidence for malpractice reform. Texas Law Rev 2002;80:1595-1637.

Studdert DM, Mello MM, Gawande AA, Gandhi TK, Kachalia A, Yoon C, Puopolo AL, Brennan TA. Claims, errors, and compensation payments in medical malpractice litigation. N Engl J Med 2006;354:2024-2033.  Read it

Mello MM, Studdert DM, Brennan TA.  Obesity--the new frontier of public health law.  N Engl J Med 2006;354(24):2601-2610. Read it

Mello MM, Studdert DM. Deconstructing negligence: the role of individual and system factors in causing medical injuries. Georgetown Law J 2008;96:599-623.  Read it

Medical Liability: The role of "health courts" in liability reform:http://www.rwjf.org/pr/product.jsp?id=20391

Obesity and Chronic Disease Prevention: How far can employer wellness programs legally go to encourage employees to adopt healthier behaviors? http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/multimedia/Audio/2008/mello08

Obesity and Chronic Disease Prevention: New York City's innovative legal initiatives to regulate trans fat and require menu labels indicating calorie counts at chain restaurants: http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/multimedia/audio/2009/Mello_Transfat/

Assistant or Associate Professor.  The Department of Health Policy and Management at the Harvard School of Public Health seeks candidates for the position of assistant orassociate professor of law and public health. This is a tenure-ladderposition.  See details.