Wendy Opsahl, PhD, MA

Senior Principal

Wendy Opsahl photo

As a senior health communications professional, Wendy Opsahl, PhD helps clients address challenges and meet goals through strategic communications, consumer engagement, education, management, and performance improvement. Much of Dr. Opsahl's work focuses on assisting federal agencies with communicating important information to key stakeholders in order to effect change. For example, she developed and tested consumer-friendly language for the CMS Home Health Compare website to aid visitors in understanding how to use quality measures and data to inform decision making. She also leads communications activities for the Premier Hospital Improvement Innovation Network, a CMS-funded network of 500 hospitals is charged with improving patient safety and reducing hospital readmissions. She's led communications projects for SAMHSA, the VA Military Sexual Trauma Support Team, the VA National Center for PTSD, and the Greater Los Angeles Health Care System.  

A longtime specialist in the field of rural health, she worked with the VA Office of Rural Health to evaluate and disseminate 26 rural promising practices across the Veterans Health Administration, aided CMS in establishing its Rural Health Council, and supported a portfolio of 11 rural-related projects for the Capitol Health Care Network. She led a national outreach campaign to promote Mental Health First Aid to rural audiences that led to more than 450 requests for training sessions. She previously served as communications director for the Center for Rural Health at the University of North Dakota School of Medicine and Health Sciences, where she led communications for the Upper Midwest Rural Health Research Center and the Rural Health Research Gateway. She is the former editor of North Dakota Medicine, Health Workforce News, and the Center for Rural Health Update.

She is active with AcademyHealth, serving on the Translation and Dissemination Institute's advisory committee and with the Membership committee. A sought-out speaker who presents regularly across the country, she was named a 2013 Presidential Awardee by the American Association of Public Health Physicians and a 2010 Hersch Scholar by AcademyHealth. She occasionally moonlights as a university instructor, most recently to teach health communications with the Georgetown University Department of Health Systems Administration.

Dr. Opsahl holds a Doctor of Philosophy degree in Educational Leadership, with a research focus on knowledge translation practices of health services research organizations. She holds a Master of Arts degree in Communications and Bachelor of Arts degrees in Communications and Sociology from the University of North Dakota.