Dr. Wendy Weber to serve as director of the National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health + +... +... +... +...

Dr. Wendy Weber to serve as director of the National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health Dr. Wendy Weber Today, National Institutes of Health (NIH) Director Jay Bhattacharya, M.D., Ph.D., announced that Wendy Weber, N.D., Ph.D., has been selected to serve as director of NIH’s National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health (NCCIH). Since October 2025, Dr. Weber has provided scientific leadership and strategic counsel and contributed to budget oversight to NCCIH as acting deputy director. She began her new role on August 23, 2026. https://www.nih.gov/news-events/news-releases/dr-wendy-weber-serve-director-national-center-complementary-integrative-health The National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health (NCCIH) is pleased to announce the selection of Wendy J. Weber, N.D., Ph.D., M.P.H., as the next director of NCCIH, effective August 23, 2026. “I am genuinely honored to be stepping into this role, and I'm excited about what's ahead,” said Dr. Weber. “I am so excited to take on the leadership for the Center and bring us into the next chapter.” Dr. Weber has been an instrumental part of NCCIH over the last 17 years. Since October 2025, she served as acting deputy director of NCCIH, providing scientific leadership and strategic counsel during a period of transition. Before this, Dr. Weber served as the branch chief for the Clinical Research in Complementary and Integrative Health Branch in NCCIH’s Division of Extramural Research and was responsible for the oversight of NCCIH-supported clinical trials. As NCCIH director, Dr. Weber will remain committed to scientific rigor and advancing NCCIH’s programs in pain research and whole person health. “Her combination of clinical training in naturopathic medicine and doctoral-level research training in epidemiology gives Dr. Weber a rare dual perspective, bridging complementary health practice with rigorous scientific methodology,” said National Institutes of Health (NIH) Director Jay Bhattacharya, M.D., Ph.D. Dr. Weber has held a series of increasingly senior leadership roles at NCCIH and brings extensive experience with NIH and NCCIH programs, including the Pain Management Collaboratory, Helping to End Addiction Long-term® Initiative, Science of Behavior Change, and Pragmatic Trials Collaboratory. Dr. Weber earned an M.P.H. and Ph.D. in epidemiology from the University of Washington and a doctorate of naturopathic medicine (N.D.) from Bastyr University. Prior to joining NIH, Dr. Weber was a clinician-scientist and associate professor at Bastyr University. As an NCCIH-funded researcher, she was the first naturopathic physician to receive an NIH career development award, which supported her work on botanical interventions. The Pain Management Collaboratory (PMC) Closing the Gap between Science and Clinical Practice for Pain Management https://painmanagementcollaboratory.org/ The Helping to End Addiction Long-term® Initiative The NIH HEAL Initiative® is an NIH-wide effort to improve prevention and treatment strategies for opioid misuse and addiction and to enhance pain management.​ https://www.nih.gov/heal Science of Behavior Change (SOBC) https://commonfund.nih.gov/behaviorchange The Science of Behavior Change (SOBC) program used a systematic approach to improve our understanding of the underlying mechanisms that would drive behavior change. Unhealthful behaviors—such as smoking, drug and alcohol abuse, overeating, and a sedentary lifestyle—contribute to negative health outcomes and common diseases. Effective approaches to adopting and maintaining healthy behaviors remain few. Though some interventions may lead to changes in behavior in some people, scientists rarely know how or why they work. SOBC researchers used a scientific method to investigate how and why people adopt and sustain healthy behaviors. SOBC brought together scientists from various disciplines, spanning basic and translational science across different health-related behaviors, to explore how a focus on the mechanisms of behavior change in the development of behavior change interventions could reliably improve health outcomes. Rethinking Clinical Trials: A Living Textbook of Pragmatic Clinical Trials https://rethinkingclinicaltrials.org/ Welcome to the Living Textbook of pragmatic clinical trials, a collection of knowledge from the NIH Pragmatic Trials Collaboratory. Pragmatic clinical trials present an opportunity to efficiently generate high-quality evidence to inform medical decision-making. However, these trials pose different challenges than traditional clinical trials. The Living Textbook reflects a collection of special considerations and best practices in the design, conduct, and reporting of pragmatic clinical trials.