Alina I. Palimaru

Alina I. Palimaru is a policy researcher at the RAND Corporation. Her journey to date has spanned government, commerce, and the media, but primarily academia, where she has garnered extensive mixed methods research experience under world-class tutelage. At UCLA, she expanded her interest and capabilities in mixed methods, including psychometrics, in-depth interview, focus group, and video-based methods. Her research focuses on the junction of poverty and health, including health outcomes measurement, quality of life, disability, housing, and food insecurity. She has been studying the impact of quality of care on quality of life in the context of disabling pathologies (spinal cord injury), but also mental health and aging populations. Because communication is a vital component of research, Palimaru has in parallel with her academic activities pursued the complementary discipline of knowledge transfer, through polished presentations (substance with style), and as a coproducer on a series of award-winning films in health care. As associate producer on the award-winning Spinal Injury Patient Film (www.spinalinjury.tv), and Choosing a Wheelchair (www.choosingawheelchair.com), Palimaru played a key role in the development and production of patient-centered communications. These projects included considerable fundraising elements. These successful films were adopted as communication tools by NHS spinal injury centers and UK NGOs. Palimaru holds a Ph.D. in health policy and management from the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health, an M.P.P. from American University, and a B.A. in history, politics, and communication from Drexel University. She aspires to do things that matter.