A Health Podyssey

Let us know what you think about Health Affairs podcasts at [email protected]. If you have 30 minutes to spare, let us know and we'll set up a 30-minute chat for the first 20 listeners that reach out. Coffee will be on us.

This episode is sponsored by the Rural Health Research Gateway at the University of North Dakota.

The United States is facing a drug affordability crisis.

Even as we celebrate scientific discovery, the health benefits of drugs are limited due to barriers of affordability, often even for people with health insurance. The RAND Corporation reports that on average drug prices in the United States are more than two and a half times those in 32 other nations studied. The disparities are even wider when we focus just on brand name drugs.

Drug pricing is the subject of seemingly perennial debates. One side focuses on access barriers due to high prices while the other side argues that lower prices threaten future innovation.

Stacie Dusetzina from Vanderbilt University Medical Center joins A Health Podyssey to talk about the complex world of drug pricing.

She and colleagues published a paper in the April 2022 issue of Health Affairs examining the degree to which people with Medicare prescription drug benefits use the drugs that are prescribed to them.

In the paper, the authors found non-initiation rates among some beneficiaries of greater than 50 percent for certain treatments.

If you enjoy this interview, order the April 2022 Health Affairs issue to get research on access to care, hospitals and more.

Subscribe: RSS | Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Stitcher | Google Podcasts

Let us know what you think about Health Affairs podcasts at [email protected]. If you have 30 minutes to spare, let us know and we'll set up a 30-minute chat for the first 20 listeners that reach out. Coffee will be on us.

When we launched A Health Podyssey in 2020, our goal was to take listeners beyond the research published in Health Affairs.

For A Health Podyssey's one-year anniversary, we wanted to take listeners on an Excursion and speak with someone who epitomizes so much of what brings professionals into the fields of health policy and health services.
Ashish Jha from the Brown University School of Public Health is a widely published researcher whose public voice arises from a combination of deep expertise and a unique ability to explain complex concepts in an accessible language. Over the course of the COVID-19 pandemic, Jha's insights on the virus have helped many navigate thorny, complicated public health issues.

Jha's most recent publication in Health Affairs was a commentary article where he and coauthors discussed adding a climate lens to health policy discussion in the U.S. Before joining Brown University, he was at the Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health.
Today, Ashish Jha joins Health Affairs' Editor-in-Chief Alan Weil to discuss what he's learned from the COVID-19 pandemic, the bright spots he sees for health care payment reform, and how he uses social media.

This episode is sponsored by the University of Pennsylvania's Master of Health Care Innovation.

Subscribe: RSS | Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Stitcher | Google Podcasts

Let us know what you think about Health Affairs podcasts at [email protected]. If you have 30 minutes to spare, let us know and we'll set up a 30-minute chat for the first 20 listeners that reach out. Coffee will be on us.

The US government reports that the total spending on hospital care in 2019 was almost $1.2 trillion. High and highly variable hospital prices have been in the news recently in part due to new information made available under the price transparency rules implemented by the Trump administration.

Competitive markets are supposed to constrain prices, but in much of the US, there's little competition among hospitals and consolidation throughout the healthcare sector has contributed to that consolidation. The result is a number of proposals to regulate health care prices in general and for hospital prices in particular.

Leemore Dafny from the Harvard Business School and Harvard Kennedy School joins Health Affairs Editor-in-Chief Alan Weil to discuss her latest research on hospital prices and market concentration.
Dafny and colleagues published a paper in the September 2021 issue of Health Affairs analyzing hospital prices and relating them to market concentration. The authors found the relationship isn't as straightforward as one might expect — but the findings still have major implications for any consideration of regulating hospital prices.
If you like this interview, order the September issue of Health Affairs.

Pre-order the October Perinatal Mental Health Theme Issue.

Subscribe: RSS | Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Stitcher | Google Podcasts

Let us know what you think about Health Affairs podcasts at [email protected]. If you have 30 minutes to spare, let us know and we'll set up a 30-minute chat for the first 20 listeners that reach out. Coffee will be on us.

Guest: Kimberly Driggins, Executive Director, Washington Housing Conservancy

Rhea Boyd, MD, MPH, Pediatrician and Child and Public Health Advocate, interviews Kimberly Driggins from the Washington Housing Conservancy about the connections between housing security, economic mobility, and health outcomes. They also explore what it will take to reinvent an equitable, anti-racist housing system.

This season is sponsored by Deloitte.

Learn more about Deloitte's work with Drivers of Health or the Deloitte Health Equity Institute.

Related Links:

• Infrastructure law may smooth the road to health equity (Deloitte)
• Health Affairs theme issue: Housing & Health
• Neighborhoods and Health: Interventions at the Neighborhood Level Could Help Advance Health Equity (Health Affairs)
• Primary Care–Based Housing Program Reduced Outpatient Visits; Patients Reported Mental And Physical Health Benefits (Health Affairs)
• Gentrification Yields Racial And Ethnic Disparities In Exposure To Contextual Determinants Of Health (Health Affairs)

The views and opinions expressed by podcast speakers and guests are solely their own and do not reflect the opinions of Deloitte or its personnel, nor does Deloitte advocate or endorse any individuals or entities featured on the episodes.

Let us know what you think about Health Affairs podcasts at [email protected]. If you have 30 minutes to spare, let us know and we'll set up a 30-minute chat for the first 20 listeners that reach out. Coffee will be on us.

The health care sector has gone through various waves of consolidation with hospitals purchasing physician practices and hospitals, physicians, and health insurers merging with each other.

We're in the midst of a wave of consolidation.

Two years ago, Health Affairs published a paper that found more than half of US physicians and 72 percent of surveyed hospitals were affiliated with one of 637 health systems in 2018. More recently, some have estimated that the 10 largest health systems now control about a quarter of the health care market.

Consolidation brings with it various opportunities for savings and efficiency but it also concentrates market power and creates opportunities to raise prices.

Vilsa Curto from Harvard University joins A Health Podyssey to discuss the effects of consolidation and integration.

Curto and colleagues published a paper in the May 2022 issue of Health Affairs assessing trends in vertical integration and joint contracting between physicians and hospitals in Massachusetts and exploring the affects on prices for physician services.

They found notable price affects that varied according to system size and physician type.

Order the May 2022 issue of Health Affairs for research on telemedicine, disparities, pharmaceuticals, and more.

Subscribe: RSS | Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Stitcher | Google Podcasts