Penn LDI – Leonard Davis Institute of Health Economics

Four LDI Senior Fellows have been appointed to Penn Nursing term chairs, according to the University of Pennsylvania Almanac. Kathryn H. Bowles, PhD, RN, FAAN, was named to the Ralston House Endowed Term Chair in Gerontological Nursing; Patricia D'Antonio, PhD, FAAN, RN, to the Killebrew-Censits Chair in Undergraduate…

It was wrong for officials to take a 200-pound boy away from his mother for obesity-related neglect, says LDI Senior Fellow Art Caplan in an MSNBC.com article. Caplan, PhD and director of the Penn Center for Bioethics, advocates working with the child’s family to improve behavior. "The problem with an…

Do state legislatures really have sufficient resources, training and experience to review scientific literature and determine if a drug like medical marijuana is safe and effective? That controversial question is the pivot of a Philadelphia Daily News story featuring LDI Senior Fellow Michael Ashburn, director of Penn's Pain Medicine & Palliative…

LDI Senior Fellow and Penn emergency physician Zachary Meisel is featured in an eight-minute Discovery TV video feature about the IT systems used in the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania's Emergency Department.

A study led by LDI Senior Fellow Charles Branas has found that a Philadelphia cleanup campaign that turned junk-strewn inner-city vacant lots into tree-lined parks also reduced the level of gun crime in those areas. The researchers also found that residents in neighborhoods where lots had been "cleaned and greened" reported…

Despite the heavily publicized exhortations of cancer-victim celebrities like Lance Armstrong, positive thinking has no real effect on the progress, remission or treatment of cancer, according to University of Pennsylvania psychiatry professor, health care researcher, and LDI Senior Fellow James Coyne. Featured in a larger CBS News story about the power…

The Twitter-related research work of LDI Senior Fellow Raina Merchant is featured in an article in the Daily Pennsylvanian. The studies analyzed 60,000 tweets related to cardiac arrest, CPR, AEDs and resuscitation for patterns of described behavior that may provide useful insights for ER clinicians. Merchant is an assistant professor…

A recent study about college students' access to health information co-authored by LDI Senior Fellow Joshua Metlay, MD, PhD was featured in an article on the Philly.com site of the Philadelphia Inquirer. The project analyzed the websites of 426 colleges and found that less than 10 percent offered information about tobacco…

Pivoting off the Supreme Court's agreement to hear the Affordable Care Act case, Ezekiel Emanuel appeared on WHYY's "Radio Times With Marty Moss-Coane" to discuss health care costs. Ezekiel, who served as a top White House health care advisor from 2009 to earlier this year, is Penn's new Vice…

Writing in the New York Times, LDI Adjunct Senior Fellow Robert Field rebuts critics of the Affordable Care Act's individual mandate. Field, who is the author of "Health Care Regulation in America," noted "both liberals and conservatives have seen [the mandate] as essential to spreading insurance risk in a market-based…

Are physicians who elect to work part-time violating some sacred aspect of their calling? In his latest Time.com column, LDI Senior Fellow Zack Meisel explores the medical student response to that idea promoted earlier this year in a New York Times op-ed piece by Dr. Karen Silbert. The panel of…

In the latest installment of an ongoing series in The New York Times, Penn's Ezekiel Emanuel takes on the issue of medical billings' administrative costs. "Administration accounts for roughly 14 percent of what the United States spends on health care, or about $360 billion per year," he writes. "About half…

LDI Senior Fellow Raina Merchant is one of two Penn researchers who recently presented papers on the use of Twitter as a potentially life-saving educational and communications tool for cardiac arrest victims. The reports were presented at the American Heart Association's annual Scientific Sessions. Merchant, MD, is an Assistant Professor of…

The question of how much family involvement is enough in the care of an elderly patient is the subject of an AmedNews story featuring LDI Senior Fellow Jason Karlawish. Even as the push toward the patient-centered medical home stresses the invaluable role that families can play in improving compliance and health…