FALL 2017
Director's Letter
Our Center has been growing – take a look at the “welcome new CEVR staff” section below to learn more about our newest team members. As we expand our work to measure value in health care, we’re pleased to announce updates to CEVR’s two databases of cost-effectiveness analyses: the Cost-Effectiveness Analysis (CEA) Registry which contains information on over 6,400 published cost per QALY gained studies, and the Global Health Cost-Effectiveness Analysis (GHCEA) Registry which houses 540 cost per DALY averted studies. Both are now updated through 2016, and together include standardized information on some 20,000 cost-effectiveness ratios of a diverse set of healthcare strategies for a wide range of conditions and diseases. We’re also pleased to highlight recent work calling for “open-source models” for cost-effectiveness analysis, and examining the problem of avoidable hospitalizations in Alzheimer’s disease.

Wishing you a happy Thanksgiving!

Peter Neumann
Director, Center for the Evaluation of Value and Risk in Health
News
Paige Lin, Ph.D . received a new grant from the Alzheimer's Association to study racial and ethnic disparities in Alzheimer's Disease.

Earlier this month, Paige's recent work examining  unplanned readmissions among Medicare beneficiaries with Alzheimer's disease was published in Alzheimer's & Dementia .

David Kim, Ph.D . presented his paper Cumulative Network Meta-Analysis and Research Prioritization: Evolution of Treatment Effects for Stable Coronary Artery Disease at the Top Rated Abstracts Session: Advancing Statistical and Economic Methods at the Society for Medical Decision Making's 39th Annual North American Meeting in October.

James Chambers, Ph.D . received the 2017 ISPOR Bernie O'Brien New Investigator Award. Established in 2004, the Bernie O'Brien New Investigator Award honors the long-standing commitment of Bernie J. O'Brien, Ph.D. to training and mentoring new scientists in the fields of outcomes research and pharmacoeconomics.
Recent Events

Health Affairs: Understanding The Value Of Innovations In Medicine

As part of an ongoing effort to foster discussion about value in health policy, Health Affairs convened two panels on the topic in September including What’s Next For Value-Based Reimbursement In Healthcare? featuring CEVR's Peter Neumann. Full event recap, including recording, available from Health Affairs.

42nd Annual Garland Dinner

Peter Neumann gave the 42nd Annual Garland Lecture “Measuring Value in Healthcare” at Harvard Medical School in October. A full recording of the lecture is available here .
Recent Publications
Bilinski A, Neumann P, Cohen J, Thorat T, Mcdaniel K, Salomon JA. When cost-effective interventions are unaffordable: Integrating cost-effectiveness and budget impact in priority setting for global health programs. PLOS Medicine 2017;14(10).

Chambers JD, Anderson JE, Salem MN, Bugel SG, Fenech M, Mason JB, Weber P, West KP, Wilde P, Booth SL. The decline in vitamin research funding: a missed opportunity? Current Developments in Nutrition 2017;1(8).

Chambers JD, Thorat T, Wilkinson CL, Neumann PJ. Drugs cleared through the FDA’s expedited review offer greater gains than drugs approved by conventional process Health Affairs 2017;36(8):1408–15.

Chambers JD, Saret CJ, Anderson JE, Deverka PA, Douglas MP, Phillips KA. Examining evidence in U.S. payer coverage policies for multi-gene panels and sequencing tests. International Journal of Technology Assessment in Health Care 2017;:1–7.

Chambers JD, Salem MN, D’Cruz BN, Subedi P, Kamal-Bahl SJ, Neumann PJ. A review of empirical analyses of disinvestment initiatives. Value in Health 2017;20(7):909–18.

Chambers JD, Anderson JE, Wilkinson CL, Pallavi R. Variation in the coverage of disease-modifying multiple sclerosis drugs among US payers. Am J Pharm Benefits. 2017;9(5):155-159.

Cohen JT, Neumann PJ, Wong JB. A call for open-source cost-effectiveness analysis. Annals of Internal Medicine 2017;167(6):432.

Cohen JT, Wong JB. Can economic model transparency improve provider interpretation of cost-effectiveness analysis? A response. Medical Care 2017;55(11):912–4.

Kim DD, Arterburn DE, Sullivan SD, Basu A. Association Between the Publication of Clinical Evidence and the Use of Bariatric Surgery. Obesity Surgery 2017.

Kim DD, Wilkinson CL, Pope EF, Chambers JD, Cohen JT, Neumann PJ. The influence of time horizon on results of cost-effectiveness analyses. Expert Review of Pharmacoeconomics & Outcomes Research 2017;17(6):615–23.

Lin P-J, Zhong Y, Fillit HM, Cohen JT, Neumann PJ. Hospitalizations for ambulatory care sensitive conditions and unplanned readmissions among medicare beneficiaries with Alzheimer's disease. Alzheimers & Dementia 2017;13(10):1174–8.

Neumann PJ, Cohen JT. ICER’s ICER’s revised value assessment framework for 2017–2019: A critique. PharmacoEconomics 2017;35(10):977–80.

Neumann PJ, Thorat T, Zhong Y, Anderson JE, Farquhar M, Salem MN, Sandberg E, Saret CJ, Wilkinson CL, Cohen JT. A systematic review of cost-effectiveness studies reporting cost-per-DALY averted. Plos One 2016;11(12).
Welcome New CEVR Staff
Rachel Bacon,
Global Health
Project Manager
Rachel graduated from Boston University School of Public Health with an MPH concentrated in Global Health. She is an experienced public health professional with a cross-cultural work and consulting history developed in Sub-Saharan Africa and the United States.
Joanna Emerson,
Research Assistant
Joanna recently received her MPH from Tufts School of Medicine with a concentration in Epidemiology and Biostatistics. She has academic research experience on a wide range of topics from kidney transplantation ethics to Peruvian zoonotic disease.
Eva Galvez,
Administrative Assistant
Eva has eight years of professional experience working in the healthcare industry from, diagnostics to IT software companies. She received a B.S. in Business Retailing from Lasell College.
Anna Legassie,
Business Development & Communications Manager
For the last five years, Anna worked in management consulting while also serving as a leading patient advocate in the arthritis community leveraging her professional experience to serve as an adviser to health startups, pharmaceutical companies, and other health organizations.
Ari Panzer,
Research Assistant
Ari recently graduated from Tufts University with a degree in Community Health and Psychology. At Tufts, Ari managed and played on the Quidditch team and was involved in a number of departmental research initiatives.
Harry Weissman,
Research Assistant
Harry recently graduated from Tufts University with a dual degree in Applied Mathematics and Biology. At Tufts, he was president of Hillel, led study groups, TA’d labs for the Biology Department, and played oboe in the Wind Ensemble.