Paula Lozano, MD, MPH
"When researchers partner with clinicians and leaders and bring our diverse skills to the table, we can achieve our shared goal of improving health and health care for the people and communities we serve."
Paula Lozano, MD, MPH
Senior Investigator, Kaiser Permanente Washington Health Research Institute
Director, Center for Accelerating Care Transformation
Senior Associate Medical Director for Research and Translation, Washington Permanente Medical Group
Paula.Lozano@kp.org
206-287-2113
Biography
Senior Investigator Paula Lozano, MD, MPH, is a pediatrician and medical director for research and translation at the Washington Permanente Medical Group. She also co-directs the Center for Accelerating Care Transformation (ACT Center) at Kaiser Permanente Washington Health Research Institute (KPWHRI). Dr. Lozano’s work focuses on helping Kaiser Permanente Washington succeed as a learning health system, where research informs practice and practice informs research.
“The challenges facing health care are so complex,” she says. “The learning health system seems like the best way to deliver on our promise to provide the highest quality, patient-centered, effective, and affordable care to Kaiser Permanente Washington members.”
Dr. Lozano founded Kaiser Permanente Washington’s Learning Health System (LHS) Program in 2017 and continues to lead the organization’s learning health system work through the ACT Center. Established in 2021, the ACT Center brought the LHS Program together with the MacColl Center for Health Care Innovation to help health systems nationwide accelerate care transformation and achieve lasting, equitable improvements in care delivery.
The ACT Center’s learning health system work represents Kaiser Permanente Washington’s investment in the use of rigorous evidence and research methods ─ in partnership with frontline clinicians, leaders and patients ─ to promote a culture of continuous learning. Deploying the advanced scientific methods available at KPWHRI, the ACT Center helps Kaiser Permanente Washington improve health, make care more affordable, and provide a good patient experience. Dr. Lozano leads two projects in this portfolio — Integrated Pain Management and Care Management for Chronic Pain — both aimed at promoting opioid safety and whole-person pain care.
As co-director of the CATALyST Learning Health Systems Scholars K12 Training Program, funded by Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) and the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI), Dr. Lozano trains and mentors multidisciplinary junior faculty at KPWHRI, the University of Washington (UW), and Veterans Affairs (VA).
Dr. Lozano's other research interests have included health behavior-change, obesity, self-management of chronic conditions, and health disparities. She is collaborating with KPWHRI Senior Investigator David Arterburn, MD, MPH, on Moving to Health, a National Institutes of Health (NIH)-funded project that is examining the relationships between neighborhood food and physical activity characteristics and development obesity. Dr. Lozano’s work has focused on improving health care quality through changing the delivery system, supporting clinical decision-making by providers, and supporting patients and parents in health behavior change. She has also served as an investigator for several U.S. Preventive Services Task Force evidence reviews conducted by the Kaiser Permanente Research Affiliates Evidence-based Practice Center.
Dr. Lozano practiced general pediatrics at Harborview Medical Center and Seattle Children's Hospital while on the faculty at the UW Department of Pediatrics, where she taught residents and medical students. She also served as director of the UW Primary Care Research Fellowship, funded by the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA), to provide research training in the primary care disciplines of internal medicine, family medicine, and pediatrics. She is an adjunct professor of health systems and population health at the UW School of Public Health.
RESEARCH INTERESTS AND EXPERIENCE
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Learning Health Systems
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Behavior Change
Brief behavioral interventions; co-morbid conditions; motivational interviewing; problems-solving therapy; self-management support
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Child & Adolescent Health
Asthma; anxiety and depression; Attention Deficit and Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD); chronic illness management; disadvantaged children's health care services; Medicaid managed care
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Chronic Illness Management
Child and adolescent health; collaborative approaches to transforming health care systems; patient/family self-management of chronic conditions; self-care
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Health Services & Economics
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Health Informatics
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Obesity
Childhood obesity prevention and control
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Mental Health
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Social Determinants of Health
Recent publications
Lee AK, Bobb JF, Richards JE, Achtmeyer CE, Ludman E, Oliver M, Caldeiro RM, Parrish R, Lozano PM, Lapham GT, Williams EC, Glass JE, Bradley KA. Integrating alcohol-related prevention and treatment into primary care: A cluster randomized implementation trial. JAMA Intern Med. 2023 Apr 1;183(4):e227083. doi: 10.1001/jamainternmed.2022.7083. PubMed
Lozano PM, Lane-Fall M, Franklin PD, Rothman RL, Gonzales R, Ong MK, Gould MK, Beebe TJ, Roumie CL, Guise JM, Enders FT, Forrest CB, Mendonca EA, Starrels JL, Sarkar U, Savitz LA, Moon J, Linzer M, Ralston JD, Chesley FD Jr. Training the next generation of learning health system scientists. Learn Health Syst. 2022 Sep 10;6(4):e10342. doi: 10.1002/lrh2.10342. eCollection 2022 Oct. PubMed
Cruz M, Drewnowski A, Bobb JF, Hurvitz PM, Moudon AV, Cook A, Mooney SJ, Buszkiewicz JH, Lozano P, Rosenberg DE, Kapos F, Theis MK, Anau J, Arterburn D. Differences in weight gain following residential relocation in the Moving to Health (M2H) study. Epidemiology. 2022 Sep 1;33(5):747-755. doi: 10.1097/EDE.0000000000001505. Epub 2022 May 20. PubMed
Hoopes AJ, Brandzel SD, Luce C, Ferguson DM, Shulman L, Chavez B, Lozano P, Lapham GT. What do adolescents and their parents need from mental health integration in primary care? A qualitative exploration of design insights. J Pediatr Health Care. 2022 Aug 8:S0891-5245(22)00174-2. doi: 10.1016/j.pedhc.2022.06.006. [Epub ahead of print]. PubMed
Ulloa-Pérez E, Blasi PR, Westbrook EO, Lozano P, Coleman KF, Coley RY. Pragmatic randomized study of targeted text message reminders to reduce missed clinic visits. Perm J. 2022 Apr 5;26(1):64-72. doi: 10.7812/TPP/21.078. PubMed
Figueroa Gray M, Coleman K, Walsh-Bailey C, Girard S, Lozano P. An expanded role for the medical assistant in primary care: evaluating a training pilot. Perm J. 2021 Nov 29;25:20.091. doi: 10.7812/TPP/20.091. PubMed
Buszkiewicz JH, Bobb JF, Kapos F, Hurvitz PM, Arterburn D, Moudon AV, Cook A, Mooney SJ, Cruz M, Gupta S, Lozano P, Rosenberg DE, Theis MK, Anau J, Drewnowski A. Differential associations of the built environment on weight gain by sex and race/ethnicity but not age. Int J Obes (Lond). 2021 Aug 27. doi: 10.1038/s41366-021-00937-9. [Epub ahead of print]. PubMed
Damschroder LJ, Knighton AJ, Griese E, Greene SM, Lozano P, Kilbourne AM, Buist DSM, Crotty K, Elwy AR, Fleisher LA, Gonzales R, Huebschmann AG, Limper HM, Ramalingam NS, Wilemon K, Ho PM, Helfrichfcr CD. Recommendations for strengthening the role of embedded researchers to accelerate implementation in health systems: findings from a state-of-the-art (SOTA) conference workgroup. Healthc (Amst). 2021;8 Suppl 1(Suppl 1):100455. doi: 10.1016/j.hjdsi.2020.100455. PubMed
Buszkiewicz JH, Bobb JF, Hurvitz PM, Arterburn D, Moudon AV, Cook A, Mooney SJ, Cruz M, Gupta S, Lozano P, Rosenberg DE, Theis MK, Anau J, Drewnowski A. Does the built environment have independent obesogenic power? urban form and trajectories of weight gain. Int J Obes (Lond). 2021 Sep;45(9):1914-1924. doi: 10.1038/s41366-021-00836-z. Epub 2021 May 11. PubMed
Allen C, Coleman K, Mettert K, Lewis C, Westbrook E, Lozano P. A roadmap to operationalize and evaluate impact in a learning health system. Learn Health Syst. 2021 Jan 24;5(4):e10258. doi: 10.1002/lrh2.10258. eCollection 2021 Oct. PubMed
Research
Better care for patients who drink alcohol
A new primary care approach improves alcohol-related preventive care as well as care for alcohol use disorder.
News
Toolkit offers guidance for people with persistent pain
The new comprehensive resource was written from the perspective of patients experiencing ongoing pain.
Learning health systems
Scholars and mentors strengthen bridge between research and care delivery
New paper shows mentorship boosts evidence-based, patient-centered care.
From research to practice
Predicting and preventing missed clinic visits
Biostatistician Yates Coley reports on new predictive analytics work that’s decreasing missed visits at KP Washington.
M2H study
Can where you move impact future weight gain?
A new study finds that moving from low- to high-density neighborhoods might be related to reductions in weight gain.
ACT Center
New center focuses on equitable, whole-person health care
Kaiser Permanente launches the Center for Accelerating Care Transformation.
KPWHRI In the Media
Paula Lozano, MD, MPH, and Amy Lee, MPH, offer insights on learning health systems
Breaking down barriers: Learning health system connects researchers, health professionals and communities
Healthy Debate, June 10, 2021
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