Ellen Engelhardt, PhD
Editor
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Aisha Langford, PhD
Deputy Editor
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by Ellen Engelhardt, PhD; SMDM e-newsletter Editor
Time seems to fly, it’s already the second quarter of 2021 and nature is waking up from its winter slumber, and … it’s time for a new newsletter. I hope this newsletter finds you in good health. Slowly, perhaps more slowly than many of us had hoped, we are moving towards fewer restrictions and a greater sense of ‘normality’.
Like many of you, I’ve been reflecting on the events of the past year as we passed the 1-year mark since the emergence of COVID-19. During this time, I regularly found myself wondering what I could do to help but found nothing concrete other than following the rules and trying to convince those around me to do the same. Not very satisfying I must admit, even though it makes sense that we cannot all drop everything and focus solely on COVID-19 research. But over the last couple of months, I’ve been reading about and listening to different takes on whether or not an arguably small probability of experiencing rare potentially lethal side-effects warrants putting vaccination programs on hold here in Europe and elsewhere. Irrespective of where you stand on the issue itself, it struck me that these ongoing discussions underscore (among other things) how important it is to be able to effectively convey and contextualize probabilistic information. Perhaps unsurprising that that would be one of my key takeaways from these discussion as risk communication is my passion. But a more important takeaway might be that even though it might seem that by doing non-COVID-related research you’re not helping in the efforts to get the pandemic under control, the non-COVID-related work being done in the field of medical decision making can also provide highly relevant insights. We need to keep going!
In this issue, alongside updates/announcements about upcoming meetings and events and Society news, we have the following interesting columns:
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Natasha Stout provides us a great overview of SMDM’s achievements over the past five years in her President’s column.
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Davene Wright and Jody Lin talk about how they worked on fostering community and collaboration through the SMDM Pediatric Interest Group which they co-chair.
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Aisha Langford, Deputy Editor of the newsletter, brings us a very interesting Hot Topic on the future of academic journal peer review. What is your take on this?
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Rachel Pozzar takes stock after “a year of losses and gains” in this edition’s SMDM Fellows Column.
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Ellen Engelhardt, I report the results of the January 2021 Scientific Issues in MDM Poll on the use of social media platforms. Many of you participated, thank you!
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Brian Zikmund-Fisher, Editor in Chief of MDM and MDM P&P, explains: “Medical Decision Making vs. MDM Policy & Practice: What’s the Difference?”.
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Beate Jahn reports on the development of a White paper by the German Consortium of Statistics focusing on recommendations to develop a national strategy for the collection and processing of data.
We hope you enjoy this newsletter. Please don’t hesitate to get in touch, if you have an idea for a Commentary. Please contact me (e.engelhardt@nki.nl) or Aisha (Aisha.Langford@nyulangone.org), if you’d like to discuss your Commentary idea.
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by Natasha Stout, PhD; Harvard Medical School
Dear Friends,
As we just passed the one year mark since COVID-19 first emerged, like many of you, I have been reflecting on the events and challenges of the past year and what lies ahead. In March 2020, we first packed a few things from our offices and headed home with strange uncertainty about what was coming. Now in April 2021, like many, I am still working from home and remain filled with strange uncertainty about the future. For sure, the pandemic has changed how we act, interact, and live. Instead of thinking how to measure our well-being on scales like the EQ5D or HUI, we now ponder where we are on the ZEF (zoom exhaustion and fatigue scale) and whether that scale has a floor! The events and challenges have also reinforced what we all hold dear–our families and friends, our communities, and our shared values. Over the past year, I have been inspired by the collective dedication of SMDM members to not only make our community stronger, but also the community beyond SMDM stronger.
Looking back at SMDM’s achievements over the past five years in preparation for this year’s strategic planning has also illustrated the dedication of SMDM’s members over the years. For this newsletter, I’d like to share some of those accomplishments with you. Consider this a brief review of SMDM by the numbers!
Membership:
- 542 members. (Not bad given all the challenges of this past year. For context, previously SMDM had well over 700 members.)
- One in five members is a trainee.
- 43 countries are now represented by the membership base.
Since 2016, SMDM hosted:
Eight scientific meetings including one virtual, two in Europe and one in Asia. Meeting themes included public and clinical policy, questions about value and uncertainty, and decisions across the lifespan. At those meetings:
- 3,461 people attended from over 40 countries.
- 1,801 oral abstracts and posters were presented.
- 2,177 people registered to take over 120 short courses.
- More than 200 mentees met with their one-on-one mentors and many more participated in career panels, workshops and the trainee lunch.
- 83 participants learned and grew at the 2020 Advocates for Equity, an event that started as the 2014 Women in SMDM event and has since evolved to address equity concerns more broadly.
- 16 member-led Interest Groups met during the meetings and in between.
- Five scholarships for dependent care were awarded since 2019 enabling members who are primary caregivers and needed assistance to attend the Annual Meetings. Thank you to SMDM members who have donated to support this new initiative.
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48 trainees and low and middle-income countries (LMIC) members were awarded scholarships to become new members and attend the 2020 Annual Meeting. The LMIC scholarship program started many years ago and was just expanded last year thanks to funding from the Moore Foundation and SMDM members.
Outside of scientific meetings, SMDM has launched, taught, supported, and created:
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A new journal, MDM Policy & Practice, which is now beginning its 6th year and indexed in PubMed.
- Numerous short courses and workshops were conducted by members in conjunction with universities, professional societies, and government agencies around the world. Many of these were made possible through funding from SMDM, the US Veterans Administration, and partnerships with other societies like the American Urological Association and the Society for Decision Professionals.
- Three on-site trainings including two in the US and one in Georgia were given for patient/physician communication and supported by funding through the Hess Foundation. While this program has been on pause with COVID-19, we are looking forward to restarting it later this year.
- More than 20 patient ambassadors, representatives, and advocates helped SMDM plan Annual meetings and contributed to presentations, symposia, and research. These activities were supported by funding from PCORI, AHRQ, and other sources. In addition, SMDM also applied for funding to train patient reviewers, added a glossary of terms to help make our meetings more accessible, and increased the use of lay abstracts for our conferences and journals.
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Four pre- and post-doctoral fellows are now supported by the SMDM-Moore Foundation fellowship program which is now in its 2nd year.
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94 COVID-19 decision models and tools from investigators around the world are documented on the SMDM COVID Decision Model Repository.
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Nine modeling teams were supported under the SMDM COVID Decision Modeling Initiative funded by the Moore Foundation to develop decision tools for policy evaluation of prevention and mitigation activities as well as vaccination, diagnostic, and treatment interventions.
- One code of conduct supporting inclusion and diversity was created.
- Following the Statement on Racism from the Board last year, SMDM launched a special Task Force on Anti-Racism, Diversity, and Inclusion to guide SMDM’s next steps.
- 1905 users have followed SMDM on Twitter and as of earlier this year, 132 users have done the same via LinkedIn
And, in honor of Women’s History Month in the US:
- 12 of 17 elected Officers and Trustees are women in 2021. SMDM’s first eight person Board of Trustees in 1980 had one woman (Barbara McNeil). What a milestone!
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Please join me in thanking all those who made these accomplishments and more possible over the past five years. The list was not exhaustive and if I have forgotten one of yours, please let me know! In the coming months we will put these milestones and more on the website to more formally acknowledge those who led this work.
I’d like to close by looking ahead. Strategic planning is currently underway at SMDM. Thank you to all who filled out the membership survey last month! That was one step in the process. Given the uncertainty created by the pandemic and its impact on SMDM members, we are taking a more focused tactic with the strategy setting steps this round to maintain our solid foundation and allow us to be nimble and adaptable to the ever-changing environment brought on by the pandemic. Our goal is to identify three to five highly focused strategies to advance SMDM’s mission and grow SMDM and support our members and their careers over the next three years. We envision these to be a mix of inward and outward facing initiatives. This tighter focus is somewhat different from our prior planning activities which used a longer five-year planning horizon and took a more expansive view of goals and what was possible. Nonetheless our underlying goals are the same: ensure SMDM remains a method innovator, continues to support and promote clinical and policy relevant work, and develops a pipeline for the next generation of SMDMers with an eye towards increasing diversity and inclusion.
One of my longtime collaborators always challenges us to follow Wayne Gretzky's hockey advice and “skate to where the puck is going to be.” I would love your thoughts about where SMDM should skate.
- Where do you see our field in three years?
- What are the most pressing methods questions that SMDMers are uniquely situated to address?
- What are the most pressing clinical or policy issues that SMDMers are uniquely poised to tackle?
- How can SMDM make difference in your career and make a difference in the world around us?
Please email me (natasha_stout@hms.harvard.edu) to share your ideas and thoughts about these questions or anything else related to SMDM’s future.
I know we have a long way to go before we get back to ‘normal’, but I’m looking forward to the day when we can gather together again in person. Until then, I hope to see you at SMDM’s upcoming virtual events including the April 28th CDMI Webinar and the June 7th European Spring Event!
Take care,
Natasha
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The opinions stated in the following commentaries are solely those of the authors and do not reflect the opinions of the Society for Medical Decision Making or the author's institution. |
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Beyond Conferences: Fostering Community and Collaboration in SMDM Interest Groups
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by Davene Wright, PhD and Jody Lin, MD, MS
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Interest group affiliations are a core SMDM member benefit. Interest groups are a forum for like-minded people to foster a sense of community, promote collaborations, disseminate members’ work, and help attract new SMDM members. Interest groups should also help promote the SMDM mission, “to advance medical decision-making research and practice to improve health outcomes.”
In 2020, we became co-chairs of the SMDM Pediatric Interest Group. Initially, we sought a stronger presence of our group within and outside of SMDM. In this spirit, we branded ourselves as the Decision Sciences for Child Health Collaborative (DSCCo), designed a logo, and started a website, newsletter, and twitter account.
Inspired by other decision science collaboratives and centers such as ConVOI, DARTH, and CHERISH, we identified our mission to be: To foster collaborations between clinicians, researchers, practitioners, patients, and caregivers, to educate pediatric researchers about decision sciences methods, to highlight excellent pediatric decision sciences research, and to identify areas where decision science can improve pediatric research, practice, and policy.
Within that mission, we organized a symposium and companion paper, hosted virtual conference abstract watch parties, and, capitalizing on a timely policy issue, hosted a journal club regarding COVID-19 models and school closures which had over 100 registrants. SMDM helped promote this event and can provide infrastructure (e.g., a Zoom webinar) to facilitate hosting similar events. Our future plans include developing instructional case studies regarding pediatric-related clinical and policy questions that decision science methods can inform. We will also be hosting watch parties and a networking event at the upcoming virtual meeting of the Pediatric Academic Societies (PAS) this Spring. If you would like to join us, visit our events page and/or subscribe to our mailing list [mailto:dscco+subscribe@googlegroups.com].
Running an interest group with little time and few resources can be challenging. But with guidance from SMDM leadership and a small group of engaged members, we are well on our way to achieving our long-term goal of becoming a funded multi-institutional center that provides resources to develop and enhance collaborative research efforts focused on improving pediatric medical decision making.
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Aisha Langford, PhD, MPH
Deputy Editor
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Hot Topics: The Future of Academic Journal Peer Review |
By Aisha Langford, PhD, MPH; Deputy Editor
The peer review process for journal articles has its share of joys and pains. For authors, reviewer comments are often helpful and in turn, typically result in a stronger manuscript. There are, however, times when reviewer comments are unclear, conflicting, and disparaging. For reviewers, requests to review journal articles can feel never-ending. One colleague noted that she receives roughly two to four requests to review journal articles each week. Another colleague has seen a noticeable increase in requests to review journal articles during the COVID-19 pandemic. This drastic increase in requests is due in part to the large number of COVID-specific articles submitted over the past year and in part due to the growing number of non-COVID manuscripts submitted from ongoing research projects.
The “publish or perish” nature of academia creates an interesting dilemma for peer review: more papers are being submitted and fewer colleagues have bandwidth to actually review papers. I serve as an associate editor for two academic journals and have seen first-hand how challenging it can be to find reviewers. For example, it is not uncommon for me to invite 10 to 20 potential reviewers before getting someone to agree. “Competing obligations” or “too busy” are common reasons people state for declining review requests. Related, as a junior researcher who submits a fair number of manuscripts to journals, I am often frustrated that the peer review process takes so long.
Some will argue that we all have a professional duty to contribute to the peer review process. Others question whether it is time for reviewers to rise up in mass rebellion. Some key questions that continue to emerge are for example:
- How many journal article reviews is “enough” for one to conduct in a calendar year?
- Should the number of journal articles you review be proportionate to the number of articles you send out for peer review?
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Should peer reviewers be paid?
- If peer reviewers were paid, how much would be appropriate?
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What is the best way to train people on how to review a manuscript?
- Can our current system sustain itself with volunteer peer reviewers?
Where do you stand?
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Eline Krijkamp,
PhD Student
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Rachel Pozzar, PhD, RN, FNP-BC |
Kyu Eun Lee, PhD Candidate |
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SMDM Fellows Column:
“A Year of Losses and Gains”
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In previous columns, our SMDM fellows introduced themselves, talked about strategies to remain productive despite the pandemic, and offered suggestions on how to prepare for the SMDM conference.
By Rachel Pozzar, PhD, RN, FNP-BC
As we mark the one-year anniversary of the COVID-19 pandemic, it’s difficult not to reflect on the losses we’ve accumulated: loss of life, loss of social contact, and loss of certainty, to name a few. When I began my postdoctoral fellowship in 2019, the two-year position that lay ahead seemed to stretch far into the future. After a year at home, those two years look decidedly shorter. We have all lost something, but as members of SMDM, we are fortunate to be part of an organization in which collaboration across borders and time zones is the norm rather than the exception.
My working relationship with my SMDM and postdoctoral fellowship mentor, Dr. Donna Berry, is one example. Each week, I call Donna in Seattle from my home in Boston. This was our routine even prior to the pandemic. From a distance, she has guided me to complete my mixed methods study of patient-centered communication and treatment decision making in ovarian cancer care. We recruited participants online, administered an internet survey, and completed follow-up interviews over Zoom. Our survey results indicate greater perceived patient-centered communication is associated with better quality of life. Preliminary interview findings suggest key components of shared decision making are absent from interactions that are not perceived to be patient-centered. This suggests shared decision making is valuable even in the presence of evidence-based treatment guidelines—and bolsters my interest in the interplay between communication and decision science.
In addition to conducting my own research, I’ve been fortunate to build a network of collaborators that has not been limited by physical distance. These partnerships have allowed me to strengthen my background in palliative care and symptom science; contribute to patient-centered COVID-19 research; and explore career opportunities. I have found the SMDM virtual meetings, short courses, and fellowship seminars to be especially reliable sources of good and thought-provoking ideas. My SMDM co-fellows—Eline, Ruth, and Kyu—and our fellowship director, Dr. Scott LaJoie, have been a supportive presence through it all. They and the rest of SMDM have helped to tip the balance of the past year towards a “gain.”
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Ellen Engelhardt, PhD
Editor
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Results from the January 2021 Scientific Issues in MDM Poll:
The use of Social Media Platforms
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By Ellen Engelhardt, PhD; SMDM e-newsletter Editor
In the first poll of 2021, we asked you about your views on various social media platforms. These platforms can be an asset, helping people to connect and share ideas irrespective of where they are in the world. Unfortunately, there is also reason for concern about these platforms due to issues such as misinformation, hate speech and harassment. Many of you (N=111) again contributed your views, thank you! The majority of respondents (67%) were from the United States, 32% work in the subfield of Decision Psychology and Shared Decision Making, 30% in the subfield of Health Services Outcomes and Policy Research and 24% in the subfield of Applied Health Economics.
In total, 88% (98/111) of respondents indicated that they use social media platforms. The social media platforms most frequently used by respondents for professional purposes are Twitter (45%) and LinkedIn (24%). Sixty-two percent of respondent indicated that using Twitter has the potential to add value to SMDM and 47% think LinkedIn could add value to the Society. The two most commonly cited reasons for using both Twitter and LinkedIn professionally were: networking/community engagement and to share/learn about research. A third of respondents also think that using Twitter during conferences to post their own and/or read/respond to colleagues’ comments would be of added value for the Society.
Thirteen out the 111 respondents indicated that they do not use any social media platform. Reasons listed for why they do not use social media platforms related to concerns about cyber security, privacy and the accuracy of the information/opinions. One respondent wrote: “The way social media has been used by others has persuaded me that there are many risks and few benefits”. When asked whether they thought that using any social media platform would be of added value to SMDM, 42% (5/12 respondents) indicated that using LinkedIn has the potential to add value to the Society.
The use of social media platforms is not without controversy, but a significant proportion of respondents use them and think that they could add value to SMDM.
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Brian Zikmund-Fisher, PhD
Editor in Chief, Medical Decision Making and Medical Decision Making Policy & Practice
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Medical Decision Making vs. MDM Policy & Practice: What’s the Difference? |
By Brian Zikmund-Fisher, PhD; Editor in Chief, Medical Decision Making and Medical Decision Making Policy & Practice
As I begin my term as the new Editor-in-Chief of SMDM’s two journals, it has been interesting to note that the single most common question I have been asked is the same as the most common question I myself asked outgoing editor Alan Schwartz when I started preparing to become Editor:
How do you define the difference between Medical Decision Making (MDM) and MDM Policy & Practice (MDM P&P)?
It’s a fair question. MDM is our flagship journal, now starting its 41st volume, and it has a well-earned reputation for high quality, methodologically rigorous papers that remain relevant and citable for many years. MDM P&P, its open access companion journal, was only founded in 2016. While MDM P&P is already indexed in PubMed / PubMedCentral, it still needs to mature as a journal before it will be eligible for its own impact factor, etc. MDM P&P’s title makes it clear that it emphasizes application, but exactly what types of articles are best submitted there (vs. at MDM) has apparently been unclear to many.
So, let me take this opportunity to define what I see as the core scope of each journal:
For MDM, the focus remains on publishing reports of methodological innovations (of all types) and reviews of such work relevant to medical decision making research or practice. This includes exemplary manifestations of policy or practice questions, especially when those incorporate innovation and can serve to demonstrate how to do good medical decision making research.
For MDM P&P, the focus is on providing exemplary applications of standard medical decision making methods to important problems that speak to the needs of practitioners and policymakers. Well-implemented examples that are not methodologically novel but which use best practices and which provide clear, actionable findings will always have a home at MDM Policy & Practice. These papers may be topically specific (i.e., only interesting to specific groups of practitioners or policymakers), although we particularly value papers that frame present their methods and findings as case studies with potentially broader application. MDM P&P is also interested in how-to articles that speak to a practitioner audience. (See, for example our call for papers for explainer articles [Link: https://doi.org/10.1177/2381468320966542] that demonstrate the relevance of MDM ideas and work to clinical, policy, and general public audiences.)
Obviously, there is overlap in the above descriptions. The editors and I see many papers that could go to either journal. (See our website at journals.smdm.org [Link: http://journals.smdm.org] for more detail.)
Yet, I want to be clear that our decisions about journal fit are based on each paper’s topic, characteristics, and target audience. Medical Decision Making and MDM Policy & Practice have different identities and different purposes. As a result, not only have we recommended transfer of certain manuscripts from MDM to MDM P&P, we have also sometimes done the reverse and recommended transfer from MDM P&P to MDM.
I hope this information can help all prospective authors to better align their papers to our journals’ scope. I also hope that the SMDM community can embrace with me a common vision for MDM Policy & Practice, one which simultaneously publishes some of our most exemplary work and which disseminates our ideas as broadly as possible.
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COVID-19: Statisticians recommend national strategy for data collection and data processing |
By Beate Jahn, PhD; Associate Professor, UMIT – University for Health Sciences
SMDM supports the development of a White Paper of DAGStat, the German Consortium of Statistics, focusing on recommendations to develop a national strategy for the collection and processing of data. DAGStat is an umbrella organization of 13 scientific societies in the field of statistics and the Federal Statistical Office in Germany. “As representatives of the Society for Medical Decision Making (SMDM), we were very proud to contribute to this important White Paper with critical discussions on tradeoff decisions and how decision analysis can support evidence-based decision making accounting for data uncertainty. As a result of the CDMI COVID-19 modeling initiative, we were able to demonstrate to the group how our decision-analytic modeling study on COVID-19 vaccination supported decision making and the development of the Austrian vaccination strategy.” said Beate Jahn, Vice President of SMDM and Co-PI of the TAV-COVID-19 Modeling project granted by SMDM.
In this White Paper, DAGStat considered data and statistics underpinning decision making using the ongoing Corona pandemic as an example. For Tim Friede, Chair of DAGStat and Professor at the University Medical Center Göttingen, Germany, and all participating societies it is important that many derived measures and recommendations from this document also apply in situations beyond COVID-19 and will support further preparedness activities of pandemics and crises. “Recommendations on data availability, transparency, communication, interdisciplinary cooperation, link to decision making and statistical literacy” are key to make full use of the power of data” explains Uwe Siebert, representative of the German Society of Epidemiology (DGEpi) and former President of SMDM. “Recommendations in these specific areas will be published shortly to foster linking data science and health decision science and to drive discussions on preparedness around the world”.
The first presentation of the White Paper was accompanied by a symposium "Power to the Numbers? Statistics in Politics" in cooperation with the German-American Institute (DAI) with contributions from the perspective of the Statistical Office of the European Union, the Data Ethics Commission of the German government, and Academics. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WYAIYt5UbSw
Department of Public Health, Health Services Research and Health Technology Assessment
UMIT – University for Health Sciences, Medical Informatics and Technology, Austria
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Tobias Kurth, MD, MSc, ScD |
Uwe Siebert, MD, MPH, MSc, ScD |
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European Spring Event – 7 June 2021
2:00 PM - 8:00 PM CET | 1:00 PM - 7:00 PM UTC | 8:00 AM - 2:00 PM EDT
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You won’t want to miss this free, virtual event focused on Preparedness for Pandemics: Shaping Future Research, Communication and Informed Public Health Decision Making. This fast-paced six-hour educational session will cover the linking of scientific researchers and international decision-making bodies; preparedness for future outbreaks, epidemics and pandemics; how to approach critical communications including risk communications, communicating science to non-scientists, communication of values and tradeoffs, ethical considerations, and more.
Register today to reserve your place. Watch the website for the latest information about the program and the special social gathering that is being planned.
Event Planning Chairs
Beate Jahn, PhD, UMIT, Austria
Silke Siebert, MD, UMIT, Austria
Tobias Kurth, MD, MSc, ScD, Charite, Germany
Uwe Siebert, MD, MPH, MSc, ScD, UMIT, Austria
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Invitation to Submit Scientific Abstracts and Short Course Proposals for the 2021 Annual Meeting |
Meeting co-chairs: Victoria Shaffer, PhD and Negin Hajizadeh, MD, MPH
The theme for the 2021 Annual Meeting is ‘From the Individual to Society: How Systems and Societal Factors Shape Health Care Decisions’. The past year has demonstrated an urgent need for research about how systemic and societal factors influence the health and wellbeing of individuals, and we are an international society whose work can directly inform these important issues. Our annual meetings are an outlet for research that addresses our Society’s mission, to advance research in medical decision making and improve health outcomes. We are inviting submissions for short courses and abstracts that directly address the 2021 meeting theme: How Systems and Societal Factors Shape Health Care Decisions. Additionally, scientific abstracts and short course proposals are welcome in a wide range of topics relevant to medical decision making.
Given the continued prevalence of the COVID virus, the 2021 Annual Meeting will be a virtual event. The conference will be held Monday October 18th through Wednesday October 20th. This will be a globally inclusive virtual meeting that will be designed to facilitate discussion and interaction among presenters and attendees. There will be two categories for abstract submissions:
- “The Traditional”, 10-minute oral presentations followed by Q&A sessions
- “The Lightening Round”, e-posters which include a 5-minute oral presentation over a single poster slide.
The virtual event will feature live streaming symposia, oral abstracts, and poster sessions. In addition to the scientific content presented at the meeting, SMDM also hosts several short courses on key topics related to medical decision making at both the introductory and advanced levels. This year, the society’s four core courses (Introductions to Shared Decision Making and Decision Aids, Cost Effectiveness Analysis, the Psychology of Medical Decision Making, and Decision Analytic Modeling) will be taught in the summer of 2021. The remaining short courses will be taught in fall before the annual meeting, with courses directly addressing the meeting theme offered the week before the conference. Our goal is to minimize the amount of virtual screen time required in a given week and to allow for the opportunity to take multiple short courses if desired. We are working hard to plan an interactive and stimulating virtual conference experience, and we look forward to “seeing” you in October!
Negin Hajizadeh, MD MPH
Victoria Shaffer, PhD
2021 Annual Meeting Co-Chairs
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Tobias Kurth, MD, MSc, ScD |
Uwe Siebert, MD, MPH, MSc, ScD |
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Mark your calendar for the 18th Biennial European Conference! |
Meeting co-chairs: Beate Jahn, PhD, Silke Siebert, MD, Tobias Kurth, MD, MSc, ScD, and Uwe Siebert, MD, MPH, MSc, ScD
We are delighted to report the conference dates are now confirmed for 29-31 May 2022 and it will be held at the Langenbeck-Virchow-Haus-Veranstaltungs in Berlin, Germany. This stunning, historic venue was built in 1913 to host medical conferences and educational events, and will be the perfect place to host our 2022 event with the theme “Linking Research to Evidence-Based Action for Patients, Providers and Policy Decision Makers”.
Soon we will be distributing a call for symposia; please begin thinking of compelling topics that can be considered. The call for abstracts and short courses will also be distributed later this year. Watch the website page for more information as it becomes available. We are looking forward to hosting in-person European Conferences again, and hope to see you in 2022.
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SMDM Lee B. Lusted Sub-Award in Health Services Outcomes and Policy Research
Nominate a colleague or a mentor to have the SMDM Lee B. Lusted Sub-Award named after him/her in the area of Health Services Outcomes and Policy Research (HSOP). SMDM is seeking nominations of exceptional candidates who have made contributions in HSOP. The honoree will have the Sub-Award named after him/her for five years for the period 2021 - 2026.
Candidates for having the HSOP Sub-Award named after him/her will be evaluated according to the following criteria:
- Made a seminal contribution to the field
- Ongoing contributions/involvement with the Society
- Role in teaching and mentoring
The goal is for the honoree to reflect the diversity of the HSOP community as well as the diversity of our research as a Society.
To submit your nominee, please send the name of the nominee, a letter of support, and a CV to Teresa Belmont at info@SMDM.org. The deadline to submit your nominees is Friday, April 30, 2021.
Please visit www.SMDM.org for more information on the naming of the
SMDM Lee B. Lusted Sub-Award in HSOP.
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COVID-19 Decision Models:
Connecting modelers and decision makers
28 April 2021 | 11:00 am - 1:30 pm EDT/3:00 pm to 5:30 pm UTC
You won’t want to miss this two and half-hour webinar presented by the SMDM COVID-19 Modeling Committee. Registration is complimentary to all – just click on the link below. More details about the webinar schedule, topics and speakers will be posted here when available.
Take a moment to view the latest tools and resources for compiled in the COVID-19 Repository here. You can also add a decision model to the repository on this page.
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Winner of a Short Course!
We are delighted to announce that Ellen Lipstein, Membership Committee Chair, pulled the name of Emanuel Krebs to be the short course recipient from the recent membership survey lottery. Thank you to everyone who shared their thoughts through the survey – the membership committee is currently reviewing and analyzing the results in preparation for the upcoming Board strategic planning activities.
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Tran Doan, MPH, Doctoral Candidate, University of Michigan
For her dissertation, Tran Thu Doan (doctoral candidate, University of Michigan School of Public Health) is seeking to understand the experiences of primary care physicians who regularly see adolescents, including challenges related to implementing universal depression screening for all children ages 12 and above. This study involves one 45-minute interview that will be conducted via videoconferencing or telephone in English. Participants will receive a $50 gift card to thank them for their time. If you are interested or know someone who would be a good fit, please email Tran Doan (trandoan@umich.edu) or schedule an interview now at https://calendly.com/trantdoan/teendepression.
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Enrique Saldarriaga, MS, BS, The CHOICE Institute, University of Washington
Enrique Saldarriaga was awarded the Rubenstein Endowment Fellowship to support his dissertation work. His dissertation is titled "Estimating the value of increasing our knowledge of HIV prevalence at the zip code level to enhance resources allocation. Case of study in Atlanta, Georgia.
Publication: Motaze NV, Mthombothi ZE, Adetokunboh O, Hazelbag CM, Saldarriaga EM, Mbuagbaw L, et al. The Impact of Rubella Vaccine Introduction on Rubella Infection and Congenital Rubella Syndrome: A Systematic Review of Mathematical Modelling Studies. Vaccines. 2021 Feb;9(2):84.
This a collaboration with researchers from the National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD) and the Centre of Excellence in Epidemiological Modelling and Analysis (SACEMA), South Africa.
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Jolyn Hersch, PhD, The University of Sydney
Dr. Jolyn Hersch (The University of Sydney School of Public Health) was awarded a Cancer Institute NSW Early Career Fellowship. Her project is entitled “Ensuring ethical and flexible consent in cancer genomic research and clinical practice.” The Cancer Institute is the cancer control agency established to lessen the impact of cancer across New South Wales (Australia's largest state). The award is valued at A $590,000 (US$467,000) and will run from January 2022 to December 2024.
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Richard Chapman, MS, PhD, IVI
Richard Chapman has accepted a position as Chief Scientific Officer at the Innovation and Value Initiative (IVI). He was formerly Director of Health Economics at the Institute for Clinical and Economic Review (ICER).
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Hadley Smith, PhD, MPSA, Baylor College of Medicine
Hadley Stevens Smith was awarded a K99/R00 from the National Human Genome Research Institute. Hadley's research is at the intersection of health economics and the ethical, legal, and social implications (ELSI) of genetics and genomics. Her project is entitled "An ELSI-Integrated Evaluation of the Family-Level Utility of Pediatric Genomic Sequencing," and her Mentors and Collaborators include SMDM members David Veenstra, Tara Lavelle, Eve Wittenberg, and Ashish A. Deshmukh.
David Veenstra, PhD, PharmD, Comparative Health Outcomes, Policy & Economics (CHOICE) Institute, University of Washington School of Pharmacy, Seattle, WA
Tara Lavelle, PhD, Center for the Evaluation of Value and Risk in Health (CEVR), Institute for Clinical Research and Health Policy Studies, Tufts Medical Center
Eve Wittenberg, PhD, MPP, Center for Health Decision Science, Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health
Ashish A. Deshmukh, PhD, MPH, University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston, School of Public Health
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Diagnostic Excellence Initiative request for ideas:
The Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation is pleased to announce a new funding opportunity as a part of its Diagnostic Excellence Initiative. The initiative aims to reduce harm from erroneous or delayed diagnoses, reduce costs and redundancy in the diagnostic process, improve health outcomes and save lives. The foundation is soliciting a third round of novel ideas and approaches for developing new clinical measures to improve diagnosis, specifically targeting three major categories of disease: acute vascular events, infections and cancer. The application process will involve a multi-phased competitive process. Ultimately up to eight grants will be awarded as much as $500,000 each for work done over 18 months. A full list of measure development projects that have already been funded can be found on Moore.org.
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Here are the most recent job opportunities since our last newsletter. SMDM members can stay current on the newest opportunities in the Resources Section of SMDM Connect.
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The SMDM Lifetime Contributors list acknowledges the SMDM members who have made contributions to the Annual Fund and acknowledges donations and in-kind donations, received from October 2005 - April 1, 2021. Our heartfelt appreciation goes out to everyone who has supported our Society!
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Editor-in-Chief
Netherlands Cancer Institute
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Deputy Editor
New York University Grossman School of Medicine
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