Sarah Goff

Sarah Goff

Associate Professor of Health Policy and Management
Chair, Department of Health Promotion and Policy

Maternal-child health care quality; organizational behavior; communication in health care; implementation science; health care equity

Location

Arnold House

715 North Pleasant Street
Amherst, MA 01003
United States

325 Arnold House

As a health services researcher and practicing pediatrician and internist, my research broadly seeks to address issues of quality and equity in the U.S. health care system. Much of my work focuses on health and health care for women and children. Recent studies include determining the relationship between organizational factors and pediatric health care quality, identifying barriers to effective implementation of evidence-based guidelines for perinatal depression in pediatric practices, and determining whether Medicaid accountable care organizations improve asthma outcomes for children at high risk for disparate care and outcomes. I am a mixed methodologist and use administrative data, surveys, key-informant interviews, focus groups, secondary textual analyses, and ethnographic methods to answer my research questions. I not only enjoy multidisciplinary collaboration, but also believe it is necessary to draw on the expertise found across many disciplines, including community-based partners, when trying to understand and address issues of quality and equity in the U.S. health care system.

Research Lab Website:

Learn more about my research on my research lab's website, Quality for All.

Education

  • PhD, University of Massachusetts Amherst, 2018
  • NIH Training Institute for Dissemination and Implementation Research in Health, 2017
  • Postdoctoral Fellowship, Tufts University Sackler School of Graduate Biomedical Sciences, 2011-2013
  • Postdoctoral Fellowship, Robert Wood Johnson Clinical Scholars Program, Yale School of Medicine, 2003-2005
  • MD, University of Massachusetts Medical School, 1996
  • BS, Yale University, 1991

Key Publications

Goff SL, Gurewich D, Alcusky M, Kachoria A, Nicholson J, Himmelstein J. Barriers and facilitators to implementation of value-based care models in new Medicaid accountable care organizations in Massachusetts: A study protocol. Front Public Health. (2021).  

Goff SL, Moran M, Szegda K,* Fioroni T,* DeBanate M, Byatt N. Development and pilot-testing of an adaptable protocol to address postpartum depression in pediatric practices serving lower-income and racial/ethnic minority families: Contextual considerations. Implement Sci Commun. 1; 66 (2020).  

Goff SL, Mazor KM, Pekow PS, Priya A, Lindenauer PK. Characteristics of High Performing Primary Care Pediatric Practices: A Qualitative Study. Acad Pediatr pii: S1876-2859(18)30717-4. doi: 10.1016/j.acap.2019.04.005. [Epub ahead of print]

Goff SL, Mazor KM, Priya A, Moran M, Pekow PS, Lindenauer PK. Organizational characteristics associated with high performance on quality measures in pediatric primary care: A positive deviance study. Health Care Manage Rev. 2019 May 20. doi: 10.1097/HMR.0000000000000247

Goff SL, Mazor KM, Pekow PS, White KO, Priya A, Lagu T, Guhn-Knight H, Murphy L, Youssef Budway Y, Lindenauer PK. Patient navigators and parent use of quality data: A randomized trial. Pediatrics 138: pii: e20161140 (2016).

Goff SL, Pekow PS, Avrunin J, Lagu T, Markenson G, Lindenauer PK. Patterns of Obstetric Infection Rates in a Large Sample of U.S. Hospitals. Am J Obstet Gynecol 208: 456.e1-456.e13 (2013).

Goff SL, Mazor KM, Guhn-Knight H, Budway YY, Murphy L, White KO, Lagu T, Pekow PS, Priya A, Lindenauer PK. Factors That Matter to Low-Income and Racial/Ethnic Minority Mothers When Choosing a Pediatric Practice: A Mixed Methods Analysis. J Racial Ethn Health Disparities 4:1051-1060 (2017).