Elizabeth A. Rider, MSW, MD, FAAP, FACH

Director, Boston Children’s Hospital / Harvard Medical School Faculty Fellowships in Humanism & Professionalism, and Interprofessional Leadership

Division of General Pediatrics, Department of Pediatrics, Boston Children’s Hospital

Department of Pediatrics, Harvard Medical School

Carlton Horbelt Senior Fellow, National Academies of Practice, USA

Elizabeth A. Rider, MSW, MD, FAAP, FACH, pediatrician and medical educator, is founding Director, Boston Children’s Hospital / Harvard Medical School’s Interprofessional Leadership, and Humanism and Professionalism Faculty Fellowships. She directs the international course “Difficult Conversations in Healthcare: Teaching and Practice in an Interprofessional World” and teaches for the Harvard Macy Institute. Dr. Rider completed her MD degree at Harvard Medical School, MSW degree at Smith College, pediatric residency training at Boston Children’s Hospital, and fellowship in general academic pediatrics at Massachusetts General Hospital. She brings her experience as a physician and former child and family therapist to her leadership, teaching and clinical roles.

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Dr. Rider has received various teaching and advocacy awards including the National Academies of Practice Nicholas Cummings Award, a national award for “extraordinary contributions to interprofessional healthcare education and practice”; the Platinum Medal for Excellence in Person-Centered Healthcare from the European Society for Person-Centered Healthcare; and the Community Pediatrician of the Year award from Boston Children’s Hospital. In 2014, she was appointed to the Global Compassion Council, an advisory body for the Charter for Compassion.

She is immediate past Vice President of Partnerships and Networking and former Chair of the Medicine Academy of the National Academies of Practice. Dr. Rider is a founder of the International Consortium for Communication in Healthcare, and of the Institute for Communication in Healthcare (Australia). She also leads the International Charter for Human Values in Healthcare initiative, an interprofessional collaborative effort to restore attention to core values in healthcare.

Dr. Rider has been an invited speaker and consultant in the US, Canada, UK, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Poland, Germany, Australia, Singapore, and elsewhere. Her work focuses on professionalism, communication skills, relationship-centered care, values and everyday ethics, medical / interprofessional education, and organizational culture change to mitigate burnout and enhance well-being.  An Associate Editor for Patient Education and Counseling, she is lead author of A Practical Guide to Teaching and Assessing the ACGME Core Competencies.

Bibliography (selected):

  1. Participants in the Bayer–Fetzer Conference on Physician–Patient Communication in Medical Education. Essential elements of communication in medical encounters: the Kalamazoo Consensus Statement. Academic Medicine 2001;76:390-393. doi: 10.1097/00001888-200104000-00021 Available at: https://journals.lww.com/academicmedicine/Fulltext/2001/04000/Essential_Elements_of_Communication_in_Medical.21.aspx
  2. Rider EA, Perrin JM. Performance profiles: The influence of patient satisfaction data on physicians’ practice. Pediatrics 2002;109:752-757. doi: 10.1542/peds.109.5.752  Available at: https://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/109/5/752.short
  3. Hatem D, Rider EA. Sharing stories: narrative medicine in an evidence-based world. Patient Education and Counseling 2004;54:251-253. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.pec.2004.07.009
  4. Rider EA, Keefer CH. Communication skills competencies: definitions and a teaching toolbox. Medical Education 2006;40:624-9. doi: 10.1111/j.1365-2929.2006.02500.x Available at: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1365-2929.2006.02500.x
  5. Rider EA, Hinrichs MM, Lown BA. A model for communication skills assessment across the undergraduate curriculum. Medical Teacher 2006;28:e127-e134. doi: 10.1080/01421590600726540 Available at: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/01421590600726540
  6. Lamiani G, Meyer EC, Rider EA, Browning DM, Begni E, Mauri E, Moja EA, Truog RD. Assumptions and blind spots in patient-centeredness: Action research between American and Italian healthcare professionals. Medical Education 2008;42:712-720. doi: 10.1111/j.1365-2923.2008.03038.x    
  7. Rider EA, Brashers VL, Costanza ME. Using team-based learning to develop health policy. Medical Education 2008;42:519-520. doi: 10.1111/j.1365-2923.2008.03078.x
  8. Rider EA, Volkan K, Hafler JP. Pediatric residents’ perceptions of communication competencies: Implications for teaching. Medical Teacher 2008;30:e208-e217. doi: 10.1080/01421590802208842   Available at: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/01421590802208842
  9. Calhoun AW, Rider EA, Meyer EC, Lamiani G, Truog RD. Assessment of communication skills and self-appraisal in the simulated environment: Feasibility of multi-rater feedback with gap analysis. Simulation in Healthcare 2009;4:22-29. doi:10.1097/sih.0b013e318184377a   Available at: https://journals.lww.com/simulationinhealthcare/Fulltext/2009/00410/Assessment_of_Communication_Skills_and.5.aspx
  10. Calhoun AW, Rider EA, Peterson, E, Meyer EC. Multi-rater feedback with gap analysis: an innovative means to assess communication skill and self-insight. Patient Education and Counseling 2010;80:321-326. doi A: 1016/j.pec.2010.06.027 Available at: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0738399110003897
  11. Rider EA, Nawotniak RH. A Practical Guide to Teaching and Assessing the ACGME Core Competencies, Second Edition. Marblehead, MA: HCPro, Inc., 2010; 394 pages. [BOOK] (1st edition 2007; 2nd edition 2010 – revised and expanded; includes accompanying downloadable materials.)
  12. Lamiani G, Meyer EC, Leone D, Vegni E, Browning DM, Rider EA, Truog RD, Moja EA. Cross cultural adaptation of an innovative approach to learning about difficult conversations in health care. Medical Teacher 2011;33(2):e57-64. doi: 10.3109/0142159x.2011.534207 Available at: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.3109/0142159X.2011.534207
  13. Rider EA. Advanced communication strategies for relationship-centered care. Pediatric Annals 2011;40:447-453. doi: 10.3928/00904481-20110815-08  Available at: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Elizabeth_Rider/publication/51627964_Advanced_Communication_Strategies_for_Relationship-Centered_Care/links/5a14a359aca27273c9eb048c/Advanced-Communication-Strategies-for-Relationship-Centered-Care.pdf
  14. Peterson EB, Calhoun AW, Rider EA. The reliability of a modified Kalamazoo Consensus Statement Checklist for assessing the communication skills of multidisciplinary clinicians in the simulated environment. Patient Education and Counseling 2014;93:411-418. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.pec.2014.07.013
  15. Rider EA, Kurtz S, Slade D, Longmaid III HE, Ho M-J, Pun Kwok Hung J, Eggins S, Branch Jr WT. The International Charter for Human Values in Healthcare: An interprofessional global collaboration to enhance values and communication in healthcare. Patient Educ Couns 2014;96:273-280. doi: 10.1016/j.pec.2014.06.017 Available at: https://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.pec.2014.06.017
  16. Truog RD, Brown SD, Browning D, Hundert EM, Rider EA, Bell SK, Meyer EC. Microethics: The ethics of everyday clinical practice. Hastings Center Report 2015;45:11–17. doi: 10.1002/hast.413
  17. Amaral ABCN, Rider EA, Lajolo PP, Tone LG, Pinto RMC, Lajolo MP, Calhoun AW. Development of a Brazilian Portuguese adapted version of the Gap-Kalamazoo communication skills assessment form. International Journal of Medical Education. 2016;7:400-405. doi:10.5116/ijme.583a.df42. Available at: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5164939/
  18. Branch WT Jr, Weil AB, Gilligan MC, Litzelman DK, Hafler JP, Plews-Ogan M, Rider EA, Osterberg LG, Dunne D, Derse AR, Pittman JR, Frankel RM. How physicians draw satisfaction and overcome barriers in their practices: “It sustains me”, Patient Educ Couns.2017;100(12):2320-2330. doi: 10.1016/j.pec.2017.06.004. Available at: https://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.pec.2017.06.004   
  19. Branch WT Jr, Frankel RM, Hafler JP, Weil AB, Gilligan MC, Litzelman DK, Plews-Ogan M, Rider EA, Osterberg LG, Dunne D, Derse AR, May NB. A multi-institutional longitudinal faculty development program in humanism supports the professional development of faculty teachers. Academic Medicine. 2017 Dec 1;92(12):1680-6. doi: 10.1097/ACM.0000000000001940. Available at: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5704738/
  • Awarded The ABIM (American Board of Internal Medicine) Foundation John A. Benson Professionalism Article Research Prize, American Board of Internal Medicine, April 2018.
  1. Rider EA, Gilligan MC, Osterberg LG, Litzelman DK, Plews-Ogan M, Weil AB, Dunne D, Hafler JP, May NB, Derse AR, Frankel RM, Branch WT Jr. Healthcare at the crossroads: The need to shape an organizational culture of humanistic teaching and practice. J Gen Intern Med. 2018;33:1092-1099. doi: 10.1007/s11606-018-4470-2. Available at: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6025655/
  2. Rider EA. Communication with Children and Families. In: Kline MW, Blaney SM, Giardino AP, Orange JS, Penny DJ, Schutz GE, et al (eds). Rudolph’s Pediatrics, 23rd edition. NY: McGraw-Hill, 2018, pp. 6-13. [Chapter] Link: https://accesspediatrics.mhmedical.com/content.aspx?bookid=2126&sectionid=181401137   
  3. Gilligan MC, Osterberg LG, Rider EA, Derse AR, Weil AB, Litzelman DK, Dunne DW, Hafler JP, Plews-Ogan M, Frankel RM, Branch Jr WT. Views of institutional leaders on maintaining humanism in today’s practice. Patient Educ Couns.2019;102(10):1911-6. doi: 10.1016/j.pec.2019.04.025. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.pec.2019.04.025    
  4. Rider EA, Diekman S, Doshi TL, Gautam M, Silver JK. Answering the Challenge: Diversity, Equity and Inclusion as a Key to Professionalism. Am J Med 2020;133(6):E333. doi: 1016/j.amjmed.2020.02.010 Available at: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.amjmed.2020.02.010