He is a past President of five different national or international professional organizations and has served as Editor-In-Chief for two academic journals. His 21 books and over 580 articles or chapters have been cited more than 72,000 times (H-index>116) and Google scholar includes him in the list of the most cited authors in science. He was elected to the National Academy of Medicine in 2005. In 2019 Kaplan took on a new role as an opinion editorialist, contributing op ed pieces on about a monthly basis. His work has appeared in The Wall Street Journal, USA Today, the Los Angeles Times, the Boston Globe, The San Jose Mercury News, The San Francisco Chronicle, STAT News (Boston Globe Media), RealClear Politics, MedPage, Health Affairs, The Hill, and a variety of other newspapers.