The Healthy Nudge

July 2024

Welcome to The Healthy Nudge. Each month, we'll get you up to speed on the latest developments in policy-relevant health behavioral economics research at CHIBE. See our 5 top stories below.

1) Megastudy shows that reminders boost vaccination but adding free rides does not

A Nature paper by CHIBE affiliates Drs. Katherine Milkman, Mitesh Patel, Kevin Volpp, Angela Duckworth, and colleagues

"Here we show that offering people free round-trip Lyft rides to pharmacies has no benefit over and above sending them behaviorally informed text messages reminding them to get vaccinated. We determined this by running a megastudy with millions of CVS Pharmacy patients in the United States testing the effects of (1) free round-trip Lyft rides to CVS pharmacies for vaccination appointments and (2) seven different sets of behaviorally informed vaccine reminder messages." Read the paper here.

2) Clinical trials need better diversity: HHS cites work by CHIBE affiliate

A CHIBE blog post featuring affiliate Dr. Scott Halpern

Dr. Scott Halpern (a member of CHIBE’s Internal Advisory Board) and colleagues wrote a paper on why diverse clinical trial participation matters, and they articulated several goals, which were cited by the Department of Health & Human Services in a recent brief detailing its plans to increase diversity in clinical research. Dr. Halpern was also one of approximately 70 guests invited to the White House in June for its Clinical Trials Forum to discuss efforts to improve the diversity of participants in clinical trials. Read the blog post here.

3) Effect of gamification with a support partner to increase physical activity in older adults at risk for Alzheimer's disease

An Alzheimer's and Dementia research article by CHIBE affiliates Dr. S. Ryan Greysen; Charles Rareshide, MA; Dr. Mitesh Patel, Dr. Jason Karlawish, and colleagues

"This randomized clinical trial testing the effects of a gamification intervention with a support partner to improve physical activity using a national registry of persons at risk for developing Alzheimer's disease and Alzheimer's related dementias showed a significant increase in steps per day during the intervention period that persisted into the follow-up period compared to control." Read the paper here.

4) What is the Parity Center? A Q&A with the Deputy Director

A CHIBE blog post featuring Dr. Austin Kilaru

CHIBE Associate Director Dr. Amol Navathe recently launched The Parity Center, an interdisciplinary team of experts working to catalyze reform in health care payment in a way that promotes equitable health care delivery and outcomes. CHIBE spoke with Dr. Austin Kilaru, Assistant Professor of Emergency Medicine and Deputy Director of the Parity Center, to learn more. Read the Q&A here.

5) Digital interventions to modify skin cancer risk behaviors

A Journal of Medical Internet Research paper by Dr. Carolyn J Heckman with CHIBE affiliate Dr. Karen Glanz and colleagues

This study aimed to compare 3 digital interventions designed to modify UVR exposure, sun protection, and skin cancer detection behaviors among young adults at moderate to high risk of skin cancer. See whether the active interventions were effective in improving skin cancer risk and skin cancer prevention behaviors in this paper.