Carolyn M. Clancy, M.D., was appointed Director of the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) on February 5, 2003. Prior to this appointment, Dr. Clancy served as AHRQ's Acting Director (from March 2002) and as director of the Agency’s Center for Outcomes and Effectiveness Research (COER). Dr. Clancy holds an academic appointment at the George Washington University School of Medicine (Clinical Associate Professor, Department of Medicine) and serves as the Senior Associate Editor of Health Services Research. Dr. Clancy has served on multiple editorial boards—including those of the Annals of Family Medicine, the American Journal of Medical Quality, and Medical Care Research and Review—and has published widely in peer-reviewed journals. She also has edited or contributed to seven books. She is a member of the Institute of Medicine and was elected a Master of the American College of Physicians in 2004. Dr. Clancy, a general internist and health services researcher, is a graduate of Boston College and the University of Massachusetts Medical School. Following her clinical training, Dr. Clancy was a Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation Fellow at the University of Pennsylvania. She was also an assistant professor in the Department of Internal Medicine at the Medical College of Virginia in Richmond before joining the staff of AHRQ in 1990.