VALDOSTA DAILY TIMES - "As an exemplary leader in the field of managed care, Dr. Hernandez sincerely represents the values that the Seema S. Sonnad Emerging Leader in Managed Care Research award was founded on," said Mike Hennessy Jr., president and CEO of MJH Life Sciences, parent company of the presenting body, the American Journal of Managed Care. The award was named in honor of Sonnad, who served as a mentor to many young researchers and was...
THE PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER - While several previous studies have focused on the relationship between pharmaceutical promotions and doctors' prescribing habits, this new study from lead author Mara Hollander (HPM '20) focuses on how those payments affect physicians across specialties. "There's definitely some behavioral science and social science literature that indicates that providers may perceive themselves immune to bias from gift giving - we ...
Congratulations to Marian Jarlenski for being named the recipient of the 2019 John D. Thompson Prize for Young Investigators. Jarlenski was presented with this award at the AUPHA Annual Meeting in New Orleans in June. This award is used to recognize young faculty who have received their PhD within the past six years for their contributions to the research literature in the field of health services.
PROPUBLICA - HPM's Walid Gellad said it is quite striking how much money doctors were earning from other activities aside from patient care. More than 2,500 physicians received at least half a million dollars from drug makers and medical device companies in the past five years alone. And that doesn’t include money for research or royalties from inventions. More than 700 of those doctors received at least $1 million.
Cassandra Leighton (HPM '19) is a health services solutions analyst at AmeriHealth Caritas. Headquartered in Philadelphia, AmeriHealth Caritas is a managed care organization, serving over 5.1 million Medicaid, Medicare, and Children's Health Insurance Program (CHIP) members across 11 states. In her role on the corporate analytics team, Leighton supports internal evaluation, participates in the new market entry process, and identifies new strateg...
Erika Garrison (MHA/MBA '20), Ilham Abdi (MHA '20), and Terrance Litam (MHA '20) took top honors in NAHSE's case competition held in Washington, DC. Competing among 29 teams representing the nation's top programs, the Pitt students developed a plan to address the health care needs of San Francisco's homeless population. "The team did an amazing job of preparing a creative and comprehensive solution, delivering their presentation in a very profes...
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HPM’s Julie Donohue weighs in on how marketing pharmaceuticals directly to consumers isn’t new. In the paper “A History of Drug Advertising”, Donohue outlines the case for and against these advertisements. Proponents tout patient and consumer rights to make informed decisions, while bioethicists and historians believe pharmaceutical companies are “disingenuously using the language of individual rights to support commercial activities.”
STAR TRIBUNE - Fewer than 10% of sellers appear to require a background check. “We tried to search each listing for evidence suggesting the seller would need a background check," said HPM's Coleman Drake. "The results indicate that this is a potentially large loophole on private sales. The policy implication for lawmakers is that if the government wants meaningful regulation of firearms sales, the online market needs to be included.”
CANCERNETWORK - “This was an important study because of the increasing role of high-deductible health plans in our insurance system,” said HPM's Lindsay Sabik. “As [high-deductible health plans] become more widespread, understanding their impacts for different patient populations will be important.”
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VOX - If overhauling the U.S. health care system isn’t on the table in January 2021, drug prices, the opioid crisis, hospital spending, and long-term care are all deeply important problems that a Democratic president will need to turn their attention to if he or she wins. “If [Medicare-for-all] is a no-go in Congress, then what changes would they make to the current system?” said HPM's Walid Gellad.
UNDARK - Research by HPM's Marian Jarlenski has shown women’s perception of cannabis as risky is dropping. A study published in June in the Journal of the American Medical Association found that between 2002 to 2003 and 2016 to 2017, self-reported use of cannabis in pregnancy doubled overall in the U.S., from 3.4 percent to 7 percent.
HEALIO - A child’s chance of survival in an emergency may depend on the hospital where they receive care. Researchers assessed the pediatric readiness of EDs in five states and found that hospitals with the highest scores had lower mortality rates. “For some time, we’ve known that hospitals vary widely with respect to their readiness to care for pediatric emergencies,” said HPM's Jeremy Kahn. “What’s new about our study is that for the first tim...
STAT NEWS - “This study shows that there continues to be a chance to really intervene on the prevention side,” said HPM's Marian Jarlenski. The decision to write an initial prescription is a low-hanging-fruit point of intervention, she said.
NPR - "This is a huge potential change, transformative," said HPM's Walid Gellad, director of the Center for Pharmaceutical Policy and Prescribing at Pitt.
Congratulations to HPM's Walid Gellad, who was recently named a winner of the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers — the highest honor awarded by the U.S. government to outstanding scientists and engineers who are beginning their independent research careers and who show exceptional promise for leadership in science and technology. Gellad was nominated by the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, who he previously worked w...