Nancy-Ann DeParle, one of the nation’s leading experts on healthcare and regulatory issues, was President Obama’s deputy chief of staff for policy and one of his most senior advisors. From 2009–2011, she served as counselor to the president and director of the White House Office of Health Reform, where she led the efforts on healthcare reform, including the passage of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. DeParle was often called the president’s health reform “czar,” and she helped write the sweeping law. Obama considered her input so pivotal he hailed her as one of the “unsung heroes” of his health reform team. Karen Dynan, vice president of economic studies at the Brookings Institution, said, “Nancy-Ann played a leading role in one of the most significant pieces of social legislation in a generation,” and according to TIME, “DeParle is universally known in healthcare-policy circles as one of the brightest minds of her generation.”

In 2011, DeParle was promoted to assistant to the president and deputy chief of staff. In that role, she oversaw the development and implementation of all policy and regulatory matters for the White House, including energy, environment, education, manufacturing, economic policy, and more. Exclusively represented by Leading Authorities, Inc. speakers bureau, DeParle discusses the long-term effects of the Affordable Care Act with an insider’s view of how it came to be, where the ‘bodies are buried,’ and what implementation will likely look like. She also addresses healthcare trends or the nitty gritty in issues like Medicare payment methodologies or healthcare delivery system reform.

Additionally, DeParle offers a unique perspective on the current political environment. She speaks to the esoterica of budget negotiations and the politics of a divided Congress. After leaving the White House, DeParle served as a lecturer in law at Harvard Law School and a guest scholar in economic studies at the Brookings Institution. She is currently a partner at healthcare-focused private equity firm Consonance Capital.

A Healthcare Calling. DeParle’s interest in paying for healthcare comes from experience. She was only a teenager when her mother was diagnosed with aggressive lung cancer. Her mother continued working through her treatments so she could hang onto her job-sponsored health insurance. This led her to devote her life toward becoming a health policy expert, a feat she certainly accomplished. Before her time in the Obama administration, DeParle worked in the White House budget office under President Bill Clinton and was one of his point people on the 1990s attempt at healthcare reform. Serving as the associate director for health and personnel at the Office of Management and Budget, she handled budgets for federal healthcare programs and took on the task of managing Medicare and Medicaid as the administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.

Early Career. DeParle was the first woman elected student body president at the University of Tennessee, for which Glamour magazine named her one of 1978’s top 10 college women. After graduating from Harvard Law School, Governor Ned McWherter appointed her to lead the Department of Human Services, making her the youngest Cabinet secretary in Tennessee history. As commissioner, she saw firsthand the healthcare system’s impact on workers and families.

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