Katherine Polin

Katherine has been a Research Fellow with the Technical University of Berlin’s Department of Health Care Management since February 2018 and a member of the Observatory’s Berlin hub since February 2019. She supports a variety of Observatory projects, including the State of Health in the EU profiles, the Health Systems in Action Insights pilot series, and country monitoring, where she is the editor for the Health System Policy Monitor Network (HSPM) platform for Bulgaria, the Netherlands, Slovenia, and the United States. She also serves as an editor for Health System Reviews (HiTs) on Bulgaria and Slovenia. Within the HSPM network framework, she also spearheaded the creation of the Health Reform Tracker, continuing to support its maintenance and further development, and she co-organizes the annual HSPM network meeting.  

Primary research interests include coverage of and access to health services, including sexual and reproductive health, health promotion and preventive services, health communication and health system performance assessment.

Katherine’s primary research interests include integrated and primary care, innovations in hospital care, access and quality in reproductive healthcare, policy reform dynamics, and digital health.

Katherine holds a Master's in Population Health from Columbia University and previously worked as a Consultant for SEEK Development, a strategic and organizational consultancy in global health and development, and at the Robert Koch Institute. She was a Robert Bosch Transatlantic Fellow for 2014-2015.

Recent publications

Polin K, Hjortland M, Maresso A, van Ginneken E, Busse R, Quentin W; HSPM network. "Top-Three" health reforms in 31 high-income countries in 2018 and 2019: an expert informed overview. Health Policy. 2021 Jul;125(7):815-832. doi: 10.1016/j.healthpol.2021.04.005. Epub 2021 Apr 15. PMID: 34053787.

Winitsky S, Webb E, Polin K, Shuftan N, Waitzberg R. Strengthening rehabilitation care: learning from countries’ experiences on organizing service delivery and financing. Copenhagen: European Observatory on Health Systems and Policies, WHO Regional Office for Europe; 2025. Licence: CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 IGO

Albreht T, Polin K, Pribaković Brinovec R, Kuhar M, Poldrugovac M, Ogrin Rehberger P, Prevolnik Rupel V, Vracko P. Slovenia: Health system review. Health Systems in Transition, 2021; 23(1): pp.i–188