Rishi Wadhera
Associate Professor in the Department of Health Policy and Management
Health Policy and Management, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health
Departments
Department of Health Policy and Management
Other Positions
Associate Professor of Medicine
Medicine-Beth Israel Deaconess, Harvard Medical School
Related Links
Biography
Dr. Rishi K. Wadhera, M.D., M.P.P., M.Phil. is a cardiologist at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Associate Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School, and an Associate Professor at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. He serves as Associate Director of the Richard A. and Susan F. Smith Center for Outcomes Research, one of the nation's premier cardiovascular outcomes and policy research organizations, comprising more than 14 full-time clinician scientists and 30 research staff.
Dr. Wadhera is the founding Director of the Section of Health Policy at the Smith Center, which he established and developed into one of the nation's leading NIH-funded research enterprises focused on health policy, cardiovascular outcomes, and population health. Under Dr. Wadhera's leadership, the Health Policy Section at the Smith Center has grown into a large, multidisciplinary team of 15 clinician investigators, postdoctoral research fellows, biostatisticians, and research staff. Dr. Wadhera's research program leverages advanced econometric and causal inference methods to evaluate how national health policies and reforms - including the Affordable Care Act, Inflation Reduction Act, and Medicare and Medicaid policy - impact access to care, affordability and value, quality of care, and clinical outcomes across the United States. He has authored >250 peer-reviewed publications to date, many of which have appeared in leading journals including the New England Journal of Medicine, Lancet, JAMA, British Medical Journal, Journal of the American College of Cardiology, and Circulation. He is currently the Principal Investigator of 3 R01 grants from the National Institutes of Health, the American Heart Association Established Investigator Award, and several other extramural grants. In 2026, he was elected to the American Society of Clinical Investigation (ASCI), one of the most prestigious honor societies in academic medicine, in recognition of his contributions to clinical and health policy research. Dr. Wadhera’s work has been deeply influential on the national stage and has directly led to changes in federal health policy. His expertise has been sought out by U.S. policymakers - including senior leaders at the US Department of Health and Human Services, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), and key Congressional committees such as the bipartisan Senate Budget Committee. His research has been widely cited in Congressional testimonies, Medicare Payment Advisory Commission (MedPAC) reports, and American Heart Association/American College of Cardiology clinical practice guidelines and scientific statements.
Dr. Wadhera has served as the primary research mentor for more than 40 junior investigators - including junior faculty, postdoctoral fellows, residents, and medical students - who have collectively first-authored >100 publications under his mentorship, secured competitive career development awards, and launched successful academic careers across the country. He currently serves as the primary research mentor for more than 12 trainees at the Smith Center. His contributions to mentorship have been recognized with the Harvard Medical School Excellence in Mentoring Award. Beyond his scholarly contributions, Dr. Wadhera holds influential leadership roles, serving on national expert advisory panels for the Institute for Clinical and Economic Review (ICER) and National Committee of Quality Assurance, Technical Expert Panels for national quality measures convened by CMS, and as an Associate Editor for the Journal of American College of Cardiology (JACC).
Dr. Wadhera received his M.D. from the Mayo Clinic School of Medicine as well as a Masters (M.Phil.) in Public Health as a Gates Cambridge Scholar from the University of Cambridge. He completed both his Internal Medicine Residency and Cardiovascular Medicine Fellowship at Brigham & Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School, where he received the Harvard Medical School Resident Teaching Excellence Award. During this time, he also received a Master’s in Public Policy (M.P.P.) as a Jerome H. Grossman Fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government.
Education and Training
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M.D., Medicine
Mayo Clinic School of Medicine -
M.P.P., Healthy Policy
Harvard Kennedy School of Government -
M.Phil., Public Health
University of Cambridge -
, Internal Medicine Residency
Brigham and Women's Hospital, Harvard Medical School -
, Cardiovascular Medicine Fellowship
Brigham and Women's Hospital, Harvard Medical School
Awards and Honors
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Harvard Medical School Excellence in Mentoring Award, 2023
Harvard Medical School -
Harvard Medical School Program Award for Culture of Excellence in Mentoring, 2022
Harvard Medical School -
Harvard Kennedy School Jerome Grossman Health Policy Fellowship, 2016
Harvard Kennedy School -
Harvard Medical School Resident Teaching Excellence Award, 2014
Harvard Medical School -
Gates Cambridge Scholarship, 2008
University of Cambridge -
Mayo Clinic Merit Scholarship, 2006
Mayo Clinic
