Christine M. Mcdonough PhD, PT

Christine McDonough is research assistant professor in Health Policy and Management in the Health & Disability Research Institute at the Boston University School of Public Health. She is also adjunct clinical assistant professor, orthopaedic surgery, Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth. Research interests include applying contemporary measurement methods such as Item Response Theory (IRT) and Computer Adaptive Testing (CAT) as well as current models of health, functioning and disability to the development of measures of status, functioning and clinical outcomes for musculoskeletal and aging research.

Dr. McDonough is also interested in the use of evidence to identify high value health care interventions. Dr. McDonough trained as a physical therapist at the University of Vermont and developed a deep interest in Orthopaedics in her first position as a staff physical therapist at Brigham and Women's Hospital.

She founded and directed an independent physical therapy practice focusing in orthopaedics, sports and geriatrics. After 15 years in clinical practice she undertook graduate studies at the Dartmouth Institute for Health Policy and Clinical Practice in clinical and health services research, shared decision-making, and health care and policy decision-making, including such tools as economic evaluation and decision analysis. Her doctoral research investigated the measurement characteristics of several widely used instruments to assess clinical outcomes for cost-effectiveness analysis in spine disorders, including the EQ-5D, SF-6D, HUI, and estimated QWB.