Christopher B. Forrest

Christopher B. Forrest is an American pediatrician and health sciences researcher who is Professor of Pediatrics at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania and Children's Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP). He is the Founder and Director of PEDSnet, a national pediatric learning health system comprising the nation's leading pediatric medical centers. His work has helped establish the fields of child health services research, learning health systems science, and life course health science. He co-edited the Handbook of Life Course Health Development, which has been downloaded more than one million times. Forrest is the co-author of the forthcoming book Thriving (MIT Press, 2027), which makes the case for a new science, social contract, and societal transformation approach to ensure that all people have the opportunity for lives filled with health, well-being, and resilience. He was elected to the National Academy of Medicine in 2023. He completed his internship, residency, and chief residency in pediatrics at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, followed by a health services and outcomes research fellowship at Johns Hopkins University.

Career Following his doctoral training, Forrest held a faculty position at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in the Department of Health Policy and Management, where he served as an Assistant and Associate Professor. subspecialty referral patterns, and the health status of children and adolescents.

Forrest is co-developer of the Johns Hopkins Adjusted Clinical Groups (ACGs) System, a widely used health risk assessment tool. ACGs are used by ministries of health, health plans, sickness funds, health systems, and researchers to evaluate the health risk of populations. ACG risk measures are used to adjust for differences in patient mix in provider performance assessment, resource allocation formulas, and case management programs. They are compatible with both health plan claims and electronic health records, and each day they are used in over 20 countries to improve the care and equity of service provision for millions of people. The ACG System received the AcademyHealth Health Services Research Impact Award in 2015.

Forrest subsequently moved to the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia and the University of Pennsylvania, where he holds the title of Professor of Pediatrics.

In 2024, Forrest was appointed to the Board of Regents of the National Library of Medicine by the U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services. PEDSnet is devoted exclusively to pediatric research and, as of 2026, included twelve pediatric academic health systems with data representing nearly 10 percent of all children in the United States. He served as Chair of the PROMIS Executive Committee from 2009 to 2014 and led the NIH PEPR (Pediatric Patient-Reported Outcomes) Consortium as Chair of its Steering Committee.

Life course health science Forrest is a major U.S. contributor to the emerging scientific field of life course health science. Life course health science is concerned with how interactions between individuals and their developmental environments produce health and well-being across the lifespan. The study received coverage in outlets including CNN and ScienceDaily. In 2025, Forrest and colleagues extended this line of work in JAMA, reporting worsening trends in U.S. children's mortality, chronic conditions, obesity, functional status, and symptoms from 2007 to 2023, reinforcing the life course importance of developmental ecosystems and child well-being trajectories. The 2025 study also received media coverage from outlets including NPR, CNN, PBS NewsHour, AP, and Fox News.

Thriving Beyond his work in health services and outcomes research, epidemiology, data science, and outcomes measurement, Forrest has pursued a broader inquiry into what it means for children and communities to truly thrive, describing the concept as one that unifies health, well-being, and resilience into a single framework. Most Outstanding Research Abstract of the Year, AcademyHealth (2011)