Health care in the United States costs more than in any other country in the world, and our health outcomes are both poor and inequitable in comparison with other high-income countries. There are ample opportunities to both reduce costs and improve healthcare and health outcomes. This month, we highlight IHPS research that can point policy toward better healthcare value, including in medical devices, unnecessary cancer screening, targeted food taxes, and surgical care. These diverse studies are only a fraction of our work in this area, and you can learn more at our website.
Joanne Spetz
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IHPS Focus On:
Healthcare Value and Economics
Many IHPS faculty are researching and working on policies related to healthcare value and economics. Sanket Druva, MD, MHS and Rita Redberg, MD, MS are partnering with payors to ensure that coverage policies for medical device-based procedures are evidence-based. Justin White, PhD and Dean Schillinger, MD are researching the impact and cost-effectiveness of an sugar-sweetened beverage tax levied in Oakland, California. Catherine Chen, MD is working to improve our understanding of anesthesia resource utilization during cataract surgery to better allocate anesthesia personnel. George Sawaya, MD is looking at the utilization of cervical cancer screening by women over the age of 65.
Learn more about some of IHPS's current work to improve health and healthcare through addressing healthcare value and economics.
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IHPS 50th Anniversary Fellowship Fund Drive |
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Since its founding 50 years ago, IHPS has been dedicated to training the next generation of leaders in interdisciplinary research to solve our most important health policy issues. In celebration of our anniversary and to honor our founders, Phil Lee and Lew Butler, we are establishing an endowment fund for the Philip R. Lee Fellowship. Please consider us in your end-of-year giving by donating at our dedicated webpage!
The first PRL Fellow, Kim Rhoads (l), with Phil Lee (r)
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California Labor Lab Webinar Series |
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IHPS Health Policy Grand Rounds
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Policing Opioids and Prosecuting Prescribers
Jennifer Oliva, JD
Professor
University of California, Hastings School of the Law
Jan 18, 12 - 1 pm
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Congratulations to the UCSF 2023 Emerging Scholars!
Sharad Wadhwani will visit the University of Michigan and Erica Farrand will visit the University of Pennsylvania as part of our Emerging Scholars Exchange Program with the Institute for Health Policy and Innovation (MI) and Leonard Davis Institute (PA).
IHPS will host Lauren Gerlach, DO, MS from the University of Michigan and Joanna Hart, MD, MSHP from the University of Pennsylvania. The Emerging Scholar visits will take place between February and May, 2023 and will be announced here!
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Guidelines recommend screening for latent hepatitis B virus (HBV), hepatitis C virus (HCV), and tuberculosis (TB) before initiating biologics or targeted synthetic disease-modifying antirheumatic drugs (b/ts DMARDs) to avoid reactivation of life-threatening infections. The extent to which such screening occurs in the national Veterans Health Administration (VA) healthcare system is unknown. In a recent Journal of Patient Safety article, Gabriela Schmajuk, MD, Mary Whooley, MD and colleagues share their findings that approximately two-thirds of veterans taking b/ts DMARDs have received guideline-recommended screening for HBV, HCV, and TB, but substantial facility variation was observed. Performance measures, robust multidisciplinary workflows, and electronic health record–based tools to feed information back to providers may improve screening rates for low-performing facilities.
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Diagnostic performance is uniquely challenging to measure, and providing feedback on diagnostic performance to catalyze diagnostic recalibration remains the exception to the rule in healthcare. Diagnostic accuracy, timeliness, and explanation to the patient are essential dimensions of diagnostic performance that each intersect with a variety of technical, contextual, cultural, and policy barriers. In a recent Diagnosis article, Benjamin Rosner, MD, PhD and colleagues explore the future of diagnostic performance feedback by describing the “minimum viable products” and the “ideal state” solutions that can be envisioned for each of several important barriers. Only through deliberate and iterative approaches to breaking down these barriers can we improve recalibration and continuously drive the healthcare ecosystem towards diagnostic excellence. Read more
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IHPS faculty are responding to policy challenges raised by the
COVID-19 pandemic with rapid-cycle research and technical assistance.
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Dr. Malini Mahendra is a pediatric critical care specialist who cares for children in the intensive care unit. Mahendra's research focuses on examining large, complex data sets to improve health outcomes. She uses artificial intelligence algorithms to analyze medical records and find ways to deliver more personalized and quality care to critically ill children. Mahendra earned her medical degree from the UCLA David Geffen School of Medicine. She completed her residency in pediatrics and her fellowship in pediatric critical care at UCSF. |
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Julia Adler-Milstein:
(Fierce Healthcare)
Dorie Apollonio:
(UCSF News)
Sanket Dhruva:
(Medpage Today)
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