This summer, Health Policy PhD student Karen Smith is working as a fellow at the Massachusetts Health Policy Commission (HPC). The HPC is an independent state agency that was established in 2012 to monitor healthcare spending in Massachusetts and provide healthcare policy recommendations. Karen is working on the Research and Cost Trends (RCT) team, which is responsible for the HPC’s annual Cost Trends Report.
Karen’s work focuses on low value healthcare, which is healthcare that is provided to patients but does not provide substantial benefit to them. Her project identifies new measures of low value care as well as updates low value care measures that the HPC has used in previous analyses. She is also investigating how utilization and spending on low value care vary among the different provider organizations in the state.
Learn more: Read about CEA and valuing care.
Related news: Pandya Presents on Low-Value Care