Draft:Raj Ratwani

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Raj M. Ratwani
File:Raj Ratwani.jpg
Photograph of Raj M. Ratwani
BornJuly 14, 1980 (1980-07-14) (age 45)
Torrance, California
EducationUniversity of California, San Diego
George Mason University
U.S. Naval Research Laboratory
OccupationScientist
Known forhuman factors in healthcare, usability, health information technology, patient safety
Websitewww.medstarhealth.org/innovation-and-research/medstar-health-research-institute/principal-investigators/raj-ratwani

Raj M. Ratwani is a professor, human factors engineer, and socially minded entrepreneur. He is widely known for his extensive human factors work in the healthcare domain with a focus on patient safety analytics[1], health information technology and digital health usability and safety[2][3][4], and artificial intelligence[5][6]. Ratwani's human factors approach to patient safety was featured in the documentary "The Pitch: Patient Safety's Next Generation" which was released in 2024 by Tall Tale Productions. His research on electronic health record usability was featured by Fortune magazine and highlighted the critical challenges with this technology that impacts both patients and healthcare providers[7]. His research has impacted frontline clinical practice, academia, and policy. As a socially minded entrepreneur, Ratwani co-founded a bar/restaurant, called Cause that gave all of it's profits to charity[8]. Ratwani and his business partner, Nicholas Vilelle, coined the term "Philanthropub"[9], and this model was replicated by several other entrepreneurs globally.

Early Life and Education

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Raj Mohan Ratwani was born July 14th, 1980 in Torrance, California and grew up on the Palos Verdes Peninsula. He played varsity tennis at the Palos Verdes Peninsula High School and later attended the University of California, San Diego (UCSD) where he received a bachelors of science in cognitive science with distinction in 2002. While at UCSD he played collegiate tennis in 2002-2003 as a redshirt and he also worked closely with Edwin Hutchins during his final year as part of his undergraduate honors project. Inspired by Dr. Hutchins and a course he took with Hal Pashler that introduced him to Human Factors, he pursued a doctoral degree from George Mason University in human factors and applied cognition through the department of psychology. He received his PhD in 2008 and was awarded the Edwin A. Fleishman award for his novel work on predicting human error using eye tracking methods. He completed a post-doctoral fellowship, funded by the National Research Council, at the United States Naval Research Laboratory in the Navy Center for Applied Research in Artificial Intelligence under Greg Trafton, PhD.

Career

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Ratwani is the vice president of scientific affairs at the MedStar Health Research Institute and the director of the MedStar Health National Center for Human Factors in Healthcare. He is also a professor in the department of emergency medicine at the Georgetown University School of Medicine. He has received significant federal funding for his research work including 5 R01 research awards as principal investigator and has published over 100 peer reviewed journal publications. Ratwani is well known for his work demonstrating the impact of suboptimal electronic health record (EHR) usability on patient safety with prominent empirical studies published in JAMA[3] and Health Affairs[2]. Sponsored by The Pew Charitable Trusts, he led several reports describing EHR usability and safety challenges and the actions that need to be taken to address these issues.[10][11]

Health Information Technology Policy

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Ratwani is known for elevating the importance of usability and safety in digital health applications. In 2015 Ratwani testified to the United States Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) committee at a full committee hearing titled Achieving the Promise of Health Information Technology: Improving Care Through Patient Access to Their Records. He described the critical importance of EHR usability and its impact on patient safety and provider well-being. Ratwani also served two terms on the Assistant Secretary for Technology Policy/Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology Health Information Technology Advisory Committee from January 2018 to December, 2022. This committee was established by the 21st Century Cures Act and Ratwani co-chaired several task forces as part of this work on the committee. He has informed EHR certification polices through several research studies.[12][13][14] He also led a campaign, called "EHR See What We Mean" that focused on highlighting issues with "gag clauses" in contracts between EHR vendors and healthcare facilities. These clauses prevented healthcare facility employees from discussing and showing patient safety issues associated with EHR products.[15] Ratwani's campaign showed explicit videos of EHR usability issues that contribute to patient harm. Gag clauses were eventually prohibited in these contracts.

Social Entrepreneurship

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In 2012, Ratwani and Nicholas Vilelle co-founded a bar/restaurant in Washington, DC called 'Cause, The Philanthropub". The purpose was to enable the public to have an enjoyable experience at bar/restaurant while also doing "good". The restaurant was in existence for 14 months before closing due to challenges attracting customers. The restaurant was reviewed by food critic Tom Sietsema from The Washington Post. The model established by Ratwani and Vilelle inspired several other socially minded entrepreneurs to establish food hospitality businesses that give the majority of their profits to charity. In 2015, Ratwani was invited to give the convocation address to the George Mason University College of Humanities and Social Sciences graduating class in Fairfax, Virginia.[16] In his address, titled "Fail Early, Fail Fast, Fail Often" he described his experience starting the Philanthropub and the importance of learning from failure quickly.

Awards, Honors, and Patents

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Patents

  • Human Assisted Learning in Eye Tracking Applications, Granted 2018 (US10037479B2)

References

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  1. ^ Fong, A.; Ratwani, R. (2015). "An Evaluation of Patient Safety Event Report Categories Using Unsupervised Topic Modeling". Methods of Information in Medicine. 54 (4): 338–345. doi:10.3414/me15-01-0010. ISSN 0026-1270. PMID 25833655.
  2. ^ a b Ratwani, Raj M.; Savage, Erica; Will, Amy; Fong, Allan; Karavite, Dean; Muthu, Naveen; Rivera, A. Joy; Gibson, Cori; Asmonga, Don; Moscovitch, Ben; Grundmeier, Robert; Rising, Josh (November 2018). "Identifying Electronic Health Record Usability And Safety Challenges In Pediatric Settings". Health Affairs. 37 (11): 1752–1759. doi:10.1377/hlthaff.2018.0699. ISSN 0278-2715. PMID 30395517.
  3. ^ a b Howe, Jessica L.; Adams, Katharine T.; Hettinger, A. Zachary; Ratwani, Raj M. (2018-03-27). "Electronic Health Record Usability Issues and Potential Contribution to Patient Harm". JAMA. 319 (12): 1276–1278. doi:10.1001/jama.2018.1171. ISSN 0098-7484. PMC 5885839. PMID 29584833.
  4. ^ Ratwani, Raj M; Savage, Erica; Will, Amy; Arnold, Ryan; Khairat, Saif; Miller, Kristen; Fairbanks, Rollin J; Hodgkins, Michael; Hettinger, A Zachary (2018-07-02). "A usability and safety analysis of electronic health records: a multi-center study". Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association. 25 (9): 1197–1201. doi:10.1093/jamia/ocy088. ISSN 1067-5027. PMC 7646875. PMID 29982549.
  5. ^ Ratwani, Raj M.; Classen, David; Longhurst, Christopher (2024-09-10). "The Compelling Need for Shared Responsibility of AI Oversight". JAMA. 332 (10): 787–788. doi:10.1001/jama.2024.12630. ISSN 0098-7484. PMID 39133493.
  6. ^ Ratwani, Raj M.; Bates, David W.; Classen, David C. (2024-02-23). "Patient Safety and Artificial Intelligence in Clinical Care". JAMA Health Forum. 5 (2): e235514. doi:10.1001/jamahealthforum.2023.5514. ISSN 2689-0186. PMID 38393719.
  7. ^ Johnson, Marianne (2019). "Where Economics Went Wrong: A Review Essay". SSRN Electronic Journal. doi:10.2139/ssrn.3433105. ISSN 1556-5068.
  8. ^ Vilelle, Nick. "When Mission Doesn't Matter (Enough) (SSIR)". ssir.org. Retrieved 2025-09-04.
  9. ^ "3. "Go Social, Go Green"", After the Protests Are Heard, New York University Press, pp. 77–115, 2020-12-31, doi:10.18574/nyu/9781479883646.003.0004, ISBN 978-1-4798-4057-1, retrieved 2025-09-04
  10. ^ "Ways to Improve Electronic Health Record Safety". pew.org. Retrieved 2025-09-04.
  11. ^ "Electronic Health Records—Safety and Usability". pew.org. Retrieved 2025-09-04.
  12. ^ Ratwani, Raj M.; Benda, Natalie C.; Hettinger, A. Zachary; Fairbanks, Rollin J. (2015-09-08). "Electronic Health Record Vendor Adherence to Usability Certification Requirements and Testing Standards". JAMA. 314 (10): 1070–1071. doi:10.1001/jama.2015.8372. ISSN 0098-7484. PMID 26348757.
  13. ^ Ratwani, Raj M; Hettinger, A Zachary; Fairbanks, Rollin J (2016-08-29). "Barriers to comparing the usability of electronic health records". Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association. 24 (e1): e191 – e193. doi:10.1093/jamia/ocw117. ISSN 1067-5027. PMC 7651928. PMID 27572813.
  14. ^ Pacheco, Thomas B.; Hettinger, Aaron Z.; Ratwani, Raj M. (2019-12-17). "Identifying Potential Patient Safety Issues From the Federal Electronic Health Record Surveillance Program". JAMA. 322 (23): 2339–2340. doi:10.1001/jama.2019.17242. ISSN 0098-7484. PMC 6990822. PMID 31846009.
  15. ^ Ratwani, Raj M.; Hodgkins, Michael; Bates, David W. (2018-12-25). "Improving Electronic Health Record Usability and Safety Requires Transparency". JAMA. 320 (24): 2533–2534. doi:10.1001/jama.2018.14079. ISSN 0098-7484. PMID 30489619.
  16. ^ Services, Credit: Ron Aira/Creative. "College Congratulates 2015 Graduates". College of Humanities and Social Sciences. Retrieved 2025-09-07.
  17. ^ "Conference Awards". Cognitive Science Society. Retrieved 2025-09-07.
  18. ^ www.apadivisions.org https://www.apadivisions.org/division-21/awards/alluisi?tab=4. Retrieved 2025-09-07. {{cite web}}: Missing or empty |title= (help)
  19. ^ "CHSS Distinguished Alumni - Psychology". College of Humanities and Social Sciences. Retrieved 2025-09-07.