LDI's research objectives are to:

Advance fundamental knowledge of issues central to the improvement of health care delivery through better understanding of the efficient allocation of health resources, appropriate uses of those resources, and development of innovative health care delivery systems; and;

Guide and influence health policy at the national, state, local, and organizational levels such that those policies lead to more efficient and equitable health care for the public.

Evaluation of health care interventions: The effectiveness and appropriateness of medical practice contribute significantly to the quality, outcome, and cost of care. Areas being investigated include the adoption and diffusion of new technologies, the cost-quality trade-offs in health care, and the cost effectiveness of medical interventions.

Financing, organization, delivery, and management of care: Providing affordable, quality health care to all Americans requires that financial and other barriers to access be eliminated. These barriers include insufficient alternative delivery systems, inefficient regulation, and lack of sufficient information to users of health care. LDI Senior Fellows examine factors that influence the demand for and supply of care, health care financing, management of systems, workforce issues, the economic implications of health expenditures, and resource use.

Changing provider and patient behavior: Increased competition and resource constraints influence institutional growth, structure, and adaptability, and impact on provider and patient behavior. LDI Senior Fellows are investigating how provider payment, clinical protocols and guidelines, ambulatory DRGs, resource-based relative value scales, volume performance standards, and organizational and administrative interventions influence provider, patient, and institutional decision making and behavior.

By funding pilot research, working groups and innovative small grants in the broad category of health services research, LDI’s Call for Proposals seeks to:

• Stimulate innovative research ideas among the Penn community,
• Encourage the development of new collaborations between investigators of different backgrounds and disciplines
• Encourage cross-school collaborations

Information for 2009 will be posted soon.

The Leonard Davis Institute of Health Economics (LDI) sponsored its 8th round of LDI Pilot Projects Program in 2008. LDI Pilot Project grants were funded to the following awardees:

A Community Partnership to Assess the Health of People Undergoing Mortgage Foreclosure in Philadelphia
Principal Investigator: Julia Lynch, PhD
Co-investigator: Craig Pollack, M.D., M.H.S.

Difficult Decisions in Public Health
Principal Investigator: Carolyn Cannuscio, PhD
Co-investigators: Robby Aronowitz, MD, Jennifer Pinto-Martin, PhD, MPH

Rationing of Blood Products During Shortages: A Physician Survey
Principal Investigator: Rachel Cook, MD

Patient Flow in the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit: Intensive Observation
Principal Investigator: Evan Fieldston, MD
Co-investigators: Christian Terwiesch, PhD; Mark Helfaer, MD; Richard Lin, MD; Annette Bollig, MSN, RN; Paula Agosto, Judy Verger, PhD, CRNP, CCRN; Patricia Hubbs, Heidi Martin

Shared Decision Making to Improve Treatment Outcomes in ADHD: A Qualitative Analysis
Principal Investigator: Alexander Fiks, MD, MSCE
Co-investigators: James Guevara, MD, MPH; Thomas Power, PhD;
Evaline Alessandrini, MD, MSCE; Fran Barg, PhD

The Association of Maternal Gestational Weight Gain and Childhood Obesity
Principal Investigator: David Rubin, MD, MSCE

Recruitment, Retention, and Quality Intervention Research for the Entry-Level Behavioral Healthcare Workforce: A Pilot Study
Principal Investigator: Mark Salzer, PhD
Co-investigators: Phyllis Solomon, PhD; Nancy Hanrahan, PhD

Health Related Quality of Life: Utility Preference Score for Pelvic Organ Prolapse
Principal Investigator: Judy Shea, PhD

Diffusion and Disparities in Utilization of Percutaneous Breast Biopsy
Principal Investigator: Seema Sonnad, PhD

Utilities of Claims-Based Quality Measures in Asthma in Predicting Clinical Outcomes
Principal Investigator: Pierre Yong, MD, MPH
Co-investigators: David Mandell, ScD; Sean Hennessy, PharmD, PhD; Rachel Werner, MD, PhD

Archive of past Pilot Grants

The service is simple and we hope it will be of great value to you. For your convenience, we have created a poster template in PowerPoint.
Click here to download the template:
LDI Poster template (white)

Using the service is easy. Here's how:

1. Either the first or senior author must be an LDI Senior Fellow (but not an Adjunct Senior Fellow).

2. At least two weeks before you need the poster, download the most recent version of the template. Last minute poster requests will be considered, but cannot be guaranteed.

3. You will need to save the template download to your desktop or C drive before inserting poster content. The template is in PowerPoint format, and should be easy to edit. Please do not reposition the LDI logo. Senior fellows are reminded that a condition of their Senior Fellowship is that LDI should be mentioned on all publications and presentations. There is also room for an additional logo.

3. Replace the placeholder content with your content. We have provided several tips (located on the template ) to use as guides in producing these posters.

4. Send the final version of your file to Elisabeth Madden.

5. Elisabeth will print the poster and contact you for pick up or delivery.

This is a new service and we are experimenting with it. We hope it will be of value and that we can continue to offer it free of charge.

If you're unsure how to proceed: contact Elisabeth Madden.
If you have a problem with the process or want to make suggestions: contact Elisabeth Madden.

We look forward to working with you.

The Wharton School
Health Care Systems Department
The Pension Research Council
Risk Management and Decision Processes Center

University of Pennsylvania Health System
Center for Mental Health Policy & Services Research
Center for Bioethics
Cancer Center
Center for Clinical Epidemiology and Biostatistics
Center for Preventive Ophthalmology and Biostatistics (CPOB)
Division of General Internal Medicine Health Services Research Unit
Division of General Internal Medicine Health Services Research: Useful sites
Division of General Internal Medicine Fellowships Programs, Department of Medicine
Division of Health Services Research, Department of Radiology
Institute on Aging
Office of Health Services Research
PennCERT

School of Nursing
Master's and Doctoral Programs in Nursing Administration
Center for Health Outcomes and Policy Research
Center for Nursing Research
Center for Urban Health Research

School of Dental Medicine
Dental Care Systems Department

CHOP
Center for Outcomes Research

VA Medical Center
Center for Health Equity Research and Promotion

Annenberg School for Communication
Annenberg Public Policy Center: Health Communication Area