ORH LEADERSHIP TEAM
Peter Kaboli, MD, MS
Dr. Peter Kaboli, ORH Executive Director
Peter Kaboli, MD, MS was named Executive Director in January 2024. Dr. Kaboli leads ORH's portfolio of partnerships with clinical program offices, research initiatives, and a strong innovation program of Rural Promising Practices and Enterprise-Wide Initiatives that are disseminated across Veterans Health Administration to increase access to care for hundreds of thousands of rural Veterans.
Dr. Kaboli also oversees the activities of five Veterans Rural Health Resource Centers (VRHRCs) in Iowa City, Iowa; Salt Lake City, Utah; White River Junction, Vermont; Gainesville, Florida; and Portland, Oregon. ORH’s VRHRCs serve as hubs of rural health care research, innovation, and dissemination. Dr. Kaboli ensures that ORH fulfils its legislative mandate as outlined in 38 USC § 7308 to conduct rural Veteran focused research, create innovative solutions to rural Veteran access challenges, and disseminate those solutions system-wide.
Dr. Kaboli is a core investigator with the Comprehensive Access and Delivery Research and Evaluation (CADRE) Center of Innovation; a hospitalist at the Iowa City VA Healthcare System; and a professor of internal medicine in the Division of General Internal Medicine at the University of Iowa Carver College of Medicine.
He earned his BS in biology, MS in epidemiology, and his MD from the University of Iowa. He completed his residency at LDS Hospital in Salt Lake City, Utah in 1998 along with his General Medicine Fellowship and VA Quality Scholars Fellowship at the University of Iowa/Iowa City VA Medical Center in 2000.
He has held leadership positions as Chief of Medicine, Iowa City VA Healthcare System; a Veterans Rural Health Resource Center (VRHRC) Director; and Senior Scholar of the VA Quality Scholars Fellowship program.
Dr. Kaboli’s research interests include health care access, rural health, inpatient medical care quality, development of valid methods for measuring medication appropriateness, and interventions to optimize medication delivery to vulnerable Veteran populations.
James Watts, PhD, MSW
Dr. James Watts, ORH Deputy Director
James Watts, PhD was named Deputy Director of the Department of Veterans Health Administration (VHA) Office of Rural Health in January 2025. Dr. Watts came to ORH after serving as the Associate Director of the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) Lexington Health Care System in Lexington, Kentucky. Dr. Watts was originally from the coalfields of southeastern Kentucky. The majority of his career was in the provision of mental health care, health care, and research in predominantly rural areas.
Dr. Watts brings a wealth of clinical and facility operations knowledge and experience to ORH. He is a graduate of the VISN 9 Leadership Institute, participated in the Senior Executive Assessment Program, and a graduate of the Health Care Leadership Development Program.
As ORH Deputy Director, Dr. Watts will provide leadership, guidance, and subject-matter expertise to support the development and implementation of ORH programs and projects addressing health care needs of Veterans residing in rural and highly rural areas.
Dr. Watts will provide oversight for ORH Enterprise-Wide Initiative management and development, and Veterans Rural Health Resource Center operations. He will serve as liaison to other VHA Program Offices to coordinate consistency in policy and data interpretation, consensus on qualitative and quantitative analytical methods, and effective vehicles for distributing results of analyses and supporting top level decision making with regards to rural health.
Dr. Watts is a Marine Corps Veteran and joined the VA in 2007 as a Licensed Clinical Social Worker. He later served as Social Work Service Chief from 2011 to 2020 prior to his appointment as an Associate Director. Dr. Watts received a Bachelor’s degree in Social Work from Morehead State University and a Master’s in Social Work and PhD from the University of Kentucky.
