Project Title: Tracking Health Insurance Reform: 2013–15
Principal Investigator: Jordon Peugh, M.A.
Date Awarded: April 9, 2013
Award Amount: $490,200
Building on their previous work for The Commonwealth Fund, the researchers will annually survey, over the period 2013 to 2015, three population groups whom the law’s reforms were designed to benefit―low-income adults, young adults, and older adults.
Project Title: Harkness Fellowships in Health Care Policy and Practice, 2014–15
Principal Investigator: Robin Osborn
Date Awarded: April 9, 2013
Award Amount: $1,662,793
Support for a 17th class of Harkness Fellows in Health Care Policy and Practice will allow The Commonwealth Fund to continue developing promising policy researchers and practitioners from Australia, Canada, Germany, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom.
Project Title: Safety Net Medical Home Initiative: Dissemination and Behavioral Health Integration
Principal Investigator: Jonathan Sugarman, M.D., M.P.H.
Date Awarded: April 9, 2013
Award Amount: $408,801
In June 2013, The Commonwealth Fund’s Safety Net Medical Home Initiative will officially conclude. For the past five years, it has assisted 65 community health centers in becoming patient-centered medical homes for their primarily low-income patients.
Project Title: Using Electronic Health Records to Measure Overuse of Low-Value Health Services
Principal Investigator: Thomas Sequist, M.D., M.P.H.
Date Awarded: April 9, 2013
Award Amount: $398,255
Focusing on a large Massachusetts health system (Atrius Health) that has implemented an EHR system throughout all its practices, a research team will draw upon medical claims data and information obtained from patients’ EHRs to measure the potential overuse of five common tests or procedures that are of modest or uncertain value.
Project Title: Independence at Home Learning Collaborative
Principal Investigator: Constance Row, M.P.A.
Date Awarded: April 9, 2013
Award Amount: $118,860
This grant will support technical assistance for a collaborative of 15 primary care practices and programs chosen by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) to participate in the federal Independence at Home Demonstration program.
Project Title: Understanding Variations in Care Coordination from the Patient's Viewpoint, Phase 1
Principal Investigator: Sara Singer, Ph.D., M.B.A.
Date Awarded: April 9, 2013
Award Amount: $350,000
Using a newly developed survey instrument, the research team will assess care coordination through the patient’s eyes—in this case, those of chronically ill older adults, who typically receive services from multiple providers.
Project Title: Helping States Implement New Systems of Integration for Care of Dual Eligibles, Phase 2
Principal Investigator: Stephen Somers, Ph.D., and Alice Lind, M.P.H.
Date Awarded: April 9, 2013
Award Amount: $249,977
To improve quality of care and control costs for people dually eligible for Medicare and Medicaid, the Medicare–Medicaid Coordination Office provides opportunities for states to test new ways of delivering and financing care.
Project Title: Analysis and Technical Assistance in Support of Health Reform
Principal Investigator: Sherry Glied, Ph.D.
Date Awarded: April 9, 2013
Award Amount: $198,684
Over the next year, Columbia University’s Sherry Glied and colleagues will examine federal data sets to gauge the potential effects of the reform law in areas of keen interest to policymakers.
Project Title: Enhancing the International Program's Communications and Publications Capacity, Year 5
Principal Investigator: Bradford H. Gray, Ph.D.
Date Awarded: April 9, 2013
Award Amount: $100,000
To strengthen the impact of The Commonwealth Fund’s international program and spark creative health policy thinking in the United States, this grant will support an external contractor to work with Fund staff to produce a series of issue briefs and case studies highlighting innovations in health policy and practice from abroad that might be transferable to the U.S.
Project Title: Learning from the International Experience, Year 6
Principal Investigator: Sarah Thomson, Ph.D., and Elias A. Mossialos, M.D., Ph.D.
Date Awarded: April 9, 2013
Award Amount: $199,650
The sixth in a series of grants to the London School of Economics and Political Science will support the work of a team of country health policy experts to compare best practices from around the world in caring for patients with a high burden of chronic disease and then assess the potential applicability of these practices to the United States.
Project Title: Web Publishing Alliance with Health Affairs
Principal Investigator: Susan Dentzer, M.A.
Date Awarded: April 9, 2013
Award Amount: $200,000
The Commonwealth Fund’s online publishing partnership with the policy journal Health Affairs has provided opportunities to publish Fund-supported research faster and more frequently than traditional means allow, while also raising the Fund’s professional and public profile.
Project Title: Insurance Premium Rate Review: Assessing the Industry’s Response and the Effect on Premiums Across States
Principal Investigator: Mark A. Hall, J.D.
Date Awarded: April 9, 2013
Award Amount: $161,841
In an attempt to lower the rate of growth in health insurance premiums, the Affordable Care Act requires insurers in the individual and small-group markets to report and justify their proposals for premium increases of 10 percent or more.
Project Title: Interaction of Medical Homes and Accountable Care Organizations
Principal Investigator: Robert Berenson, M.D.
Date Awarded: April 9, 2013
Award Amount: $148,621
A team from the Urban Institute will conduct a total of 36 interviews with ACO medical directors and primary care clinicians, as well as clinicians working outside of ACOs, to explore the interaction of medical homes and ACOs, with the goal of identifying practical, operational approaches to ensure they are better aligned.
Project Title: Evaluating the STAAR Collaborative’s Impact on Hospitals’ Care Transition Practices and Ability to Reduce Readmissions, Phase 2
Principal Investigator: Leslie Curry, Ph.D., and Elizabeth Bradley, Ph.D.
Date Awarded: November 13, 2012
Award Amount: $479,999
In the second phase of the STAAR evaluation, the evaluation team will identify changes in use of recommended practices for reducing readmissions, comparing baseline survey data with data collected one year later.
Project Title: Determinants of Spending Variation: The Roles of Price, Service Use, and Market Conditions in Texas
Principal Investigator: Luisa Franzini, Ph.D.
Date Awarded: November 13, 2012
Award Amount: $250,790
This project will examine what drives trends and geographic variation in spending, prices, and use for the diverse populations covered by Blue Cross Blue Shield of Texas (BCBSTX), the state’s largest commercial insurer, and by Medicare.