About Our Founder

Rick Zawadski, Ph.D.

Dr. Rick Zawadski, the Founder and Director of RTZ Associates, is a pioneer in the development and study of Adult Day Services (ADS). He helped develop On Lok, the first Medicaid-funded adult day health center in the country and was a founding member of the California and national ADS associations (CAADS and NADSA). He has conducted national surveys of ADS programs, and he was recently honored for his role as a founder of Program of All-Inclusive Care for the Elderly (PACE) and its replication project.

For the past two decades Dr. Zawadski has been involved in the development of program-based, policy-oriented information systems for ADS and community long term care (LTC), adapting program management software to collect research quality outcome data. He has published a text on community-based LTC; several articles on LTC policy, service models, financing and information systems; and has been quoted in Newsweek and other lay publications on for articles on aging and community long term care.

Additionally, Dr. Zawadski has taught graduate level courses on information systems for non-profits at the University of San Francisco. He holds a BA from the University of Notre Dame and a Doctorate from the University of California Berkeley.