Skip to main content

Mark Hoffman, PhD

Chief Research Information Officer

Mark Hoffman, PhD

Mark Hoffman, PhD, serves as the Chief Research Information Officer (CRIO) for Children’s Mercy and the Children’s Mercy Research Institute. Dr. Hoffman’s role is to accelerate and improve all types of research at the Children’s Mercy Research Institute through resources such as data, applications and technology.

Dr. Hoffman earned his BA in Molecular Biology from William Jewell College and his doctorate in Bacteriology from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, with a minor in Biotechnology. He joined Cerner in 1997 as a software engineer where he advanced to the role of Vice President for Genomics and Research.

His formal training in research and experience in software development have prepared him to effectively connect the needs of researchers to the capabilities of technology-solutions. In his role as Vice President of Research at Cerner, he had the opportunity to meet with a wide variety of clinical research organizations around the world, learning about their successes and challenges in using technology. 

In 2013, Dr. Hoffman joined the faculty at the University of Missouri Kansas City (UMKC) in the Departments of Biomedical and Health Informatics and Pediatrics and founded the Center for Health Insights at UMKC. He serves as a professor at UMKC and also has a research professor appointment in the Department of Pediatrics at the University of Kansas Medical Center, where he is an Associate Member of the Kansas University Cancer Center. 

Dr. Hoffman joined Children’s Mercy full time as CRIO in 2016. He leads a team of experts in software development, high performance computing, bioinformatics, data science and a group of analysts and project managers responsible for vendor provided research systems. 

He delivered a TEDx talk on the “Envirome” and won the iThermometer category in the Google wearable devices in health care challenge in 2015. He is an inventor of 25 issued patents, is a member of the American Academy of Inventors and has received the highest awards for alumnae of William Jewell College and the Raytown School District. Hoffman serves as co-lead of the Frontiers CTSI Informatics Core and continues to conduct research using massive de-identified electronic health record data resources. He currently seeks innovative approaches to using informatics and data to improve health and research equity. 

Dr. Hoffman’s professional background informs how he approaches his role at Children’s Mercy. But most importantly, he brings experience as a parent of two children who have been patients at the hospital. He is personally committed to ensuring that researchers at the Children’s Mercy Research Institute have access to the best technical resources and experts available to help them find answers as quickly and effectively as possible for children and their families.