Robert L. Kane

Robert L. Kane, MD, holds an endowed chair in Long-term Care and Aging at the University of Minnesota School of Public Health, where he was formerly the Dean. He directs the University of Minnesota’s Center on Aging, the Minnesota Area Geriatric Education Center, the Clinical Outcomes Research Center, and an AHRQ-funded Evidence-based Practice Center.

Dr. Kane and his sister, Joan West, wrote an account of their struggles to get adequate long-term care for their mother, It Shouldn’t Be This Way: The Failure of Long-Term Care. That experience led to his founding a national organization dedicated to improving long-term care, Professionals with Personal Experience with Chronic Care (PPECC), which has over 800 members. These experiences in turn served as the eventual inspiration for The Good Caregiver.

Dr. Kane’s extensive research on health care for older persons, especially those needing long-term care, continues to improve knowledge and practice in this field. He has analyzed long-term systems both in this country and abroad, and has consulted to a number of national and international agencies, including the World Health Organization’s Expert Committee on Aging.

He is the author or editor of 31 books and more than 470 journal articles and book chapters on geriatrics and health services research. Recent books include The Heart of Long-term Care, Assessing Older Persons, the 6th edition of Essentials of Clinical Geriatrics, the 2nd edition of Conducting Health Care Outcomes Research, and Meeting the Challenge of Chronic Illness.

Dr. Kane is a graduate of Harvard Medical School.

Dr. Robert Kane died unexpectedly on March 6, 2017. Bob was the Minnesota Chair of Aging and Long-Term Care at the University of Minnesota’s School of Public Health where he was a popular professor and media expert for more than thirty years.

Awards and Distinctions
President’s Award from the American Society on Aging
Polisher Award from the Gerontological Society of America
Enrico Greppi Prize from the Italian Society of Gerontology and Geriatrics
British Geriatrics Society Medal for the Relief of Suffering amongst the Aged
University of Minnesota’s Academic Health Center’s Academy for Excellence in Health Research