Areas of Expertise:
Michael O’Brien is a Senior Director in APCO’s Washington office and a nationally recognized healthcare communications strategist with nearly 30 years of experience advising organizations across the healthcare landscape. He brings a rare blend of agency leadership and senior-level in-house expertise, with a track record that spans biopharma, diagnostics, medtech, health systems, patient advocacy groups, professional medical societies, payers and public health institutions. Michael counsels clients on the most pressing issues in health and science communications. He helps organizations navigate an increasingly complex environment shaped by political forces, shifting patient expectations, scientific innovation and challenges to public trust. He works closely with C-suite leaders and corporate affairs teams to shape reputation, advance innovation and align key stakeholders. His focus is always on clarity – distilling complex science, policy and business issues into strategies that differentiate, protect and elevate. Michael has served as a trusted advisor to some of the world’s largest healthcare companies, leading hospital systems, and boldest emerging innovators, across a wide range of therapeutic areas. His strategic counsel is grounded in decades of frontline experience, including leading product and disease awareness campaigns, mitigating reputational risk, promoting scientific and regulatory milestones, managing M&A and liquidity events, and driving high-impact policy and advocacy initiatives.
Ever wonder how people can snow ski through thick woods? If you focus on the obstacles (the trees), all you will see is obstacles. If you focus on the path through the trees, all you will see is the path. It’s your choice how you choose to perceive your own career or your life. It’s literally perspective.
– Simon Sinek
Before joining APCO, Michael was partner and head of U.S. Healthcare Public Relations at ICR Healthcare, one of the largest independent communications firms in the country. There, he advised private and publicly traded healthcare companies on narrative development, reputation strategy, science and financial communications, and led integrated PR/IR client engagements. Earlier, he served as vice president of Corporate Communications for the University of Maryland Medical System, a $4 billion, 13-hospital network, where he led system-wide communications during the COVID-19 pandemic. He also headed the Washington, D.C., office of JPA Health, directing award-winning campaigns for Fortune 500 biopharma companies, national advocacy organizations and professional medical societies. Michael previously led the healthcare practices at Imre and MGH Inc. and held a senior leadership role on the healthcare team at FleishmanHillard. On the corporate side, he was global head of communications and a member of the executive leadership team at MedImmune, AstraZeneca’s biologics division. He also served as chief communications officer at the Kennedy Krieger Institute, a world-renowned pediatric neuroscience and rehabilitation center affiliated with Johns Hopkins Medicine. Michael began his career as a legal affairs reporter. Throughout his career, he has remained deeply committed to issues at the intersection of science, policy, equity and trust. Michael and his teams have earned nearly 150 industry awards. He holds a dual B.A. degree in Journalism and Mass Communication from the University of Delaware and has completed executive leadership programs at the Harvard Business School and the University of Maryland.