Dr Epstein directs the Rochester Center to Improve Communication in Health Care at the University of Rochester. Funded by grants from NIMH, NCI, AHRQ, and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, the Center's mission is to improve communication among members of health care teams, patients, and families. The center focuses on understanding how communication can reduce social, economic, racial and ethnic disparities in health and health care. The Center supports collaborative work among faculty from several UR Departments as well as multi-site studies. In particular, his AHRQ and NIMH-funded studies using unannounced covert standardized patients to study physicians' practice behaviors, the impact of patient-physician relationships on health and health care costs, management of ambiguity in the clinical practice and the effect of direct-to-consumer advertising on clinical care. He is also an experienced qualitative researcher, who has studied physicians' responses to patient expressions of worry, and counseling those with and at high risk for HIV disease. He has authored over 120 publications including a recent book (National Cancer Institute, 2007) to outline future research initiatives in clinical communication and cancer.

He has received awards from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, National Institute of Mental Health, Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, Department of Health and Human Services, the Pfizer-AAFP Foundation, the Koppaka Foundation, Arthur Vining Davis Foundation, the Mannix Fund, the Fulbright Foundation and other state and foundation sources. Dr. Epstein was named the first George Engel and John Romano Dean's Teaching Scholar at the University of Rochester, and is the recipient of the Lynn Payer Award from the American Academy on Communication in Healthcare for lifetime contributions to the theory, practice and teaching of effective communication. He has been a visiting professor at over 25 medical schools in the USA, South America and Europe , and keynote speaker at over 30 national and international conferences on research and medical education.

Ron Epstein graduated from Wesleyan University with a major in music in 1976 and from Harvard Medical School in 1984. He completed residency in Family Medicine at the University of Rochester – Highland Hospital Family Medicine Residency Program in 1987. At home, Dr Epstein is father of Eli (17) and Malka (14) and husband of Deborah Fox , a freelance lutenist. He enjoys playing the harpsichord, cooking, cycling and cross-country skiing.

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