Leadership
Ian Kremer
Executive Director
Ian N. Kremer, JD, has worked on federal, state and local dementia policy since 1996. Since 2012, Kremer has served as Executive Director of the LEAD Coalition (Leaders Engaged on Alzheimer’s Disease: http://www.leadcoalition.org) the uniting voice of over 200 member and allied organizations. The LEAD Coalition accelerates transformational progress in care and support to enrich the quality of life of those with dementia and their caregivers, detection and diagnosis, and research leading to prevention, effective treatment, and cures. The LEAD Coalition has helped to secure historic funding increases for the National Institutes of Health (NIH), expand Medicare services for people with dementia and protect dementia-relevant components of Medicaid and the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, expand the role of people with dementia and their care partners in medical product development, build a nation-wide network of dementia-friendly communities, and worked with a dozen federal agencies to overcome health disparities, clarify regulatory pathways, combat elder abuse, and improve cognitive impairment detection and diagnosis, clinical care, and access to home and community-based services.
Kremer serves or has served on the following steering committees, boards, or advisory committees:
- Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) Medicare Evidence Development & Coverage Advisory Committee (MEDCAC)
- National Institute on Aging (NIA) National Research Summit on Care, Services, and Supports for Persons with Dementia and Their Caregivers (2017 Summit and 2020 Summit)
- NIA-funded:
- IMbedded Pragmatic AD/ADRD Clinical Trials (IMPACT) Collaboratory
- Hopkins’ Economics of Alzheimer’s Disease and Services (HEADS) Center (Johns Hopkins University)
- Dementia Care Study (UCLA)
- Community Care Network for Dementia (CaN-D) (Emory University)
- WeCareAdvisor Study (Drexel University)
- Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)-funded:
- BOLD Public Health Center of Excellence on Early Detection of Dementia (New York University School of Medicine)
- BOLD Public Health Center of Excellence on Dementia Caregiving (University of Minnesota)
- American Indian and Alaska Native Resource Center for Brain Health (International Association for Indigenous Aging)
- CDC Healthy Brain Initiative Roadmap (2018-2023 and 2023-2027)
- Public Policy & Aging Report editorial board
- Alzheimer’s Disease Patient and Caregiver Engagement (AD PACE) initiative
- Digital Medicine Society (DiMe) ADRD Digital Measures Development project
- Dementia Friendly America initiative
- Alzheimer’s Association Roundtable on Dementia Care Navigation
- Gerontological Society of America Workgroup on Cognitive Impairment Detection and Earlier Diagnosis
- Dementia Alliance International
- Davos Alzheimer’s Collaborative Champion’s Cabinet
- Brain Health Partnership
- Alzheimer’s Disease Partnership for Evidence and Value (AD EVAL)
- Adira Foundation Board of Directors
- International Collaboration for Real-World Evidence in Alzheimer’s Disease in the US (ICARE-AD-US) Study
- PCORI Dementia Research Methods project
Kremer was an external reviewer for the 2021 National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM) report, “Meeting the Challenge of Caring for Persons Living with Dementia and Their Care Partners and Caregivers: A Way Forward” and a 2024 panelist for the NASEM Committee on Research Priorities for Preventing and Treating Alzheimer’s Disease and Related Dementias. He holds degrees from Washington University in Saint Louis and the University of Michigan School of Law.
Dr. Courtney Wallin
Federal Policy Director
Contact Dr. Courtney Wallin
Courtney Wallin, Ph.D. serves as the Federal Policy Director of the LEAD Coalition. Prior to joining LEAD in June 2025, she was the Director of the Office of Legislation, Policy, & International Activities at the National Institute on Aging (NIA), part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). In this role, she served as a liaison to Congress and other stakeholders and led a team responsible for developing high-impact products, such as the annual Alzheimer’s Disease Professional Judgment Budget and Scientific Progress Report.
Dr. Wallin joined the NIH in 2016 as a Presidential Management Fellow. Throughout her tenure, Dr. Wallin contributed to a range of projects and events, including organizing the inaugural National Dementia Care and Caregiving Research Summit in 2017, a groundbreaking event (first proposed by the LEAD Coalition) that has since set the stage for national dialogue on dementia care and led to numerous NIH funding opportunities. Dr. Wallin also served as the Outreach Lead at NIH’s All of Us Research Program in 2020 and 2021, where she led efforts to raise awareness about the value of the All of Us dataset, engage researchers from a broad range of communities, and cultivate program partnerships.
Dr. Wallin earned her Ph.D. in Cognitive Neuroscience from The George Washington University. While pursuing her doctorate, she was awarded the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship; she also received the Australian Endeavour Research Fellowship to support research training at the University of Wollongong in Australia. Dr. Wallin also holds undergraduate degrees in Biology and Psychology from Providence College.