Terry Leach

Terry Leach is a writer, health care attorney, and RN. She recently retired from her post as the coordinator of health policy for the University of California, Office of President, and as the Executive Director of UC's Center for Health Quality & Innovation.

She currently consults to a northern California county health department and is an instructor at UCSF.

Prior to this, she served as an Instructor of Health Policy at the University of Minnesota's School of Public Health, and as a health consultant to a California State Senator, working on the childhood obesity epidemic.

She also served as the Executive Director of the Rockridge Foundation, the progressive think tank founded by the linguist and author of "Don't Think of an Elephant," Dr. George Lakoff.

Ms. Leach also served as a health care attorney for ten years, offering
advice to hospital ethics committees as well as institutional review boards charged with overseeing clinical trials occurring in their institutions.

As a public health nurse, Ms. Leach provided care to migrant workers in
California's Central Valley as well as in the foothills and Bay Area.

Ms. Leach holds an MFA in writing from Bennington College, Vermont, a law degree from U.C. Berkeley School of Law (Boalt Hall), and a B.S. in Nursing with a concentration in Spanish from Cal State University, Sacramento. Several of her columns and stories about health care have been published in major newspapers, and in journals and short story collections.