Alexis Malfesi, Project Manager. Alexis has a deep understanding of Discern’s work from her time at Lewin Group, where she led the development and ongoing maintenance of clinical quality measures in outpatient hospital settings and worked on alternative payment models (APMs). Prior to that, she was an analyst at NORC working on STAR ratings for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services’ suite of Compare tools. Alexis received her MSHS in health care quality from George Washington University and a BA from the University of Maryland.

Makda Alazar, Project Analyst. Makda joins Discern with a data collection, data analysis, and program evaluation background. She developed these skills while working at Westat and the National Cancer Institute (NCI/NIH). Makda recently completed her MPH in epidemiology at George Mason University and earned an undergraduate degree in community health from the University of Maryland.

Zachary Evans, Project Analyst. Zach brings a unique combination of quantitative and qualitative education, with a BA in English and economics from Oberlin College and an MPP in quantitative and urban policy from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. At Discern, Zach supports several analytics-based projects in providing statistical and predictive modeling techniques. Zach joins Discern from the University of Maryland’s Department of Epidemiology.