Team

Bailit Health staff is comprised of a close-working team of senior consultants. Multiple team members are involved on most projects. The team is complemented, on an as-needed basis, by a cadre of specialty subject matter experts with whom we have worked for years.

Grace Flaherty, M.S., M.P.H. (she, her)
Consultant

Grace supports states in advancing health care affordability and quality. Grace also supports states in monitoring and strengthening primary care, behavioral health care and value-based payment.

Grace has been engaged in quality performance and measure alignment initiatives in multiple states. Grace assists Rhode Island and Connecticut in the implementation and maintenance of their multi-payer, statewide aligned measure sets. Grace evaluates annual performance of primary care practices in Rhode Island against its patient-centered medical home certification standards. She also supports Connecticut in the implementation of its Quality Benchmarks initiatives by collecting, validating, analyzing, and reporting payer and provider quality performance.

Grace has helped several states calculate and evaluate performance against their cost growth targets, including Connecticut and Rhode Island. She also provides technical assistance on cost growth target data collection and analysis to states participating in the Peterson-Milbank Program for Sustainable Health Care Costs.

Grace’s work on primary care has included conducting an environmental scan of primary care in Rhode Island, developing recommendations for strengthening primary care in the state and updating the state’s insurer primary care spending obligation. Grace also supports Connecticut in the implementation of its primary care spending target initiative by collecting, validating, analyzing and reporting payer primary care spending.

Grace has also contributed to behavioral health initiatives. She supports Rhode Island in implementing its insurer behavioral health spending obligation, including by developing the definition of behavioral health spending and the relevant data reporting specifications. Grace also supported the evaluation of the Blue Cross Blue Shield Foundation of Massachusetts’ behavioral health urgent care grant program.

Regarding value-based payment initiatives, Grace drafted a Commonwealth Fund state implementation guide for multi-payer value-based payment models, and she supports Connecticut in monitoring statewide alternative payment adoption by collecting and analyzing payer value-based payment data.

Previously, Grace was a Summer Fellow at the Massachusetts Health Policy Commission in the Office of the Chief of Staff and an intern in the office of U.S. Senator Tammy Baldwin. Grace earned a Bachelor of Arts with majors in Political Science and English from Williams College, a Master of Science in Food and Nutrition Policy and Programs from the Tufts Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy, and a Master of Public Health with a concentration in Health Services, Management, and Policy from the Tufts School of Medicine Public Health and Professional Degree Program.

Selected Publications

Flaherty G, Reynolds M."How Medicaid Agencies Can Leverage Multi-Payer Aligned Measure Sets", State Health and Value Strategies – October 4, 2023

Hwang A, Bailit MH, Kanneganti D, Flaherty G."State Strategies for Controlling Health Care Costs: Implementation Guides", The Commonwealth Fund – January 13, 2023

Flaherty G, Kanneganti D. "Ensuring Health Care Cost Growth Targets Promote Health Equity", Milbank Memorial Fund, April 13, 2022.