David A. Asch
- Professor of Medicine, Professor of Medical Ethics and Health Policy, Professor of Health Care Management, Professor of Operations, Information and Decisions
- Executive Director, Center for Health Care Innovation
- John Morgan Professor
Contact Information
- Primary Email:
asch@wharton.upenn.edu - Office Phone:
(215) 746-2705
- office Address:
PCAM 14-171 South Tower
3400 Civic Center Boulevard
Philadelphia, PA 19104
Research Interests: behavioral economics, clinician and patient decision making, health care management, health policy, medical ethics, physician executives, technology assessment
Overview
Education
MD, Cornell University, 1984
MBA, The Wharton School, 1989
AB, Harvard University, 1980
Career and Recent Professional Awards; Teaching Award
RWJF David E. Rogers Award – Association of American Medical Colleges, 2018
Wharton Health Care Alumni Association Achievement Award, 2017
Article of the Year Award – AcademyHealth, 2016
Luigi Mastroianni Clinical Innovator Award, 2014
Distinguished Graduate Award, Perelman, School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania, 2012
John M. Eisenberg National Award for Career Achievement in Research, Society of General Internal Medicine, 2010
Alpha Omega Alpha Robert J. Glaser Distinguished Teacher Award, Association of American Medical Colleges, 2009
Under Secretary’s Award for Outstanding Achievement in Health Services Research, Department of Veterans Affairs, 2008
Elected Member, Institute of Medicine, 2007
Christian R. and Mary F. Lindback Award for Distinguished Teaching, 2006
Elected Member, Association of American Physicians, 2005
Arthur K. Asbury Outstanding Faculty Mentor Award, 2004
Research Mentorship Award, Society of General Internal Medicine, 2004
Robert C. Witt Research Award, American Risk and Insurance Association, 2000
Samuel P. Martin, III Award in Health Services Research, 1999
Outstanding Investigator Award in Clinical Science, American Federation for Medical Research, 1999
Nellie Westerman Prize, American Federation for Medical Research, 1998
Outstanding Paper Award, Society for Medical Decision Making, 1997
Alice Hersh New Investigator Award, AcademyHealth, 1997
John M. Eisenberg Teaching Award, 1995
Academic Positions Held
Wharton: 1998-present
Named Robert D. Eilers Professor, 1998-2012
Executive Director, Leonard Davis Institute of Health Economics 1998-2012
University of Pennsylvania: 1989-present
Chief, Section of General Internal Medicine, Philadelphia VA Medical Center, 1993-1996
Director, Center for Health Equity Research and Promotion, Department of Veterans Affairs, 2001-2012
Director, Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Health and Society Scholars Program, 2002-2014
Executive Director, Penn Medicine Center for Health Care Innovation, 2012-present
Director, Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Clinical Scholars Program, 2013-present
Research
Colman Humphrey, Dylan Small, Shane T. Jensen, Kevin Volpp, David A. Asch, Jingsan Zhu, Andrea B. Troxel (2019), Modeling Lottery Incentives for Daily Adherence, Statistics in Medicine, 38 (15), pp. 2847-2867.
Jeffrey H. Silber, Lisa M. Bellini, Judy A. Shea, Sanjay V. Desai, David F. Dinges, Mathias Basner, Orit Even-Shoshan, Alexander S. Hill, Lauren L. Hochman, Joel T. Katz, Richard N. Ross, David M. Shade, Dylan Small, Alice L. Sternberg, James Tonascia, Kevin G. Volpp, David A. Asch, for the iCOMPARE Research Group (2019), Patient Safety Outcomes under Flexible and Standard Resident Duty-Hour Rules, New England Journal of Medicine, 380, pp. 905-914.
Mathias Basner, David A. Asch, Judy A. Shea, Lisa M. Bellini, Michele Carlin, Adrian J. Ecker, Susan K. Malone, Sanjay V. Desai, Alice L. Sternberg, James Tonascia, David M. Shade, Joel T. Katz, David W. Bates, Orit Even-Shoshan, Jeffrey H. Silber, Dylan Small, Kevin G. Volpp, Christopher G. Mott, Sara Coats, Daniel J. Mollicone, David F. Dinges for the iCOMPARE Research Group (2019), Sleep and Alertness in a Duty-Hour Flexibility Trial in Internal Medicine, New England Journal of Medicine, 380, pp. 915-923.
Mitesh S. Patel, Kevin G. Volpp, Roy Rosin, Scarlett L. Bellamy, Dylan Small, Jack Heuer, Susan Sproat, Chris Hyson, Nancy Haff, Samantha M. Lee, Lisa Wesby, Karen Hoffer, David Shuttleworth, Devon H. Taylor, Victoria Hilbert, Jingsan Zhu, Lin Yang, Xingmei Wang, David A. Asch (2018), A Randomized, Controlled Trial of Lottery-Based Financial Incentives to Increase Physical Activity Among Overweight and Obese Adults, American Journal of Health Promotion, (in press).
Judy A. Shea, Jeffrey H. Silber, Sanjay V. Desai, David F. Dinges, Lisa M. Bellini, James Tonascia, Alice L. Sternberg, Dylan Small, David M. Shade, Joel Thorp Katz, Mathias Basner, Krisda H. Chaiyachati, Orit Even-Shoshan, David Westfall Bates, Kevin G. Volpp, David A. Asch, the iCOMPARE Research Group (2018), Development of the Individualised Comparative Effectiveness of Models Optimizing Patient Safety and Resident Education (iCOMPARE) Trial: a Protocol Summary of a National Cluster-randomised Trial of Resident Duty Hour Policies in Internal Medicine, BMJ Open, 8(9):e021711.
Mitesh S. Patel, Gregory W. Kurtzman, Sneha Kannan, Dylan Small, Alexander Morris, Steve Honeywell Jr, Damien Leri, Charles A. L. Rareshide, Susan C. Day, Kevin B. Mahoney, Kevin G. Volpp, David A. Asch (2018), Effect of an Automated Patient Dashboard Using Active Choice and Peer Comparison Performance Feedback to Physicians on Statin Prescribing Rates: The PRESCRIBE Cluster Randomized Clinical Trial, JAMA Network Open, 1(3):e180818.
Sanjay V. Desai, David A. Asch, Lisa M. Bellini, Krisda H. Chaiyachati, Manqing Liu, Alice L. Sternberg, James Tonascia, Alyssa M. Yeager, Jeremy M. Asch, Joel T. Katz, Mathias Basner, David W. Bates, Karl Y. Bilimoria, David F. Dinges, Orit Even-Shoshan, David M. Shade, Jeffrey H. Silber, Dylan Small, Kevin G. Volpp, and Judy A. Shea for the iCOMPARE Research Group (2018), Education Outcomes in a Duty-Hour Flexibility Trial in Internal Medicine, New England Journal of Medicine, 378, pp. 1494-1508.
Scott D. Halpern, Benjamin French, Dylan Small, Kathryn Saulsgiver, Michael O. Harhay, Janet Audrain-McGovern, George Loewenstein, David A. Asch, Kevin G. Volpp (2016), Heterogeneity in the Effects of Reward- and Deposit-based Financial Incentives on Smoking Cessation, American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine, 194 (8), pp. 981-988.
Mitesh S. Patel, Neha Patel, Dylan Small, Roy Rosin, Jeffrey I. Rohrbach, Nathaniel Stromberg, C. William Hanson, David A. Asch (2016), Change In Length of Stay and Readmissions among Hospitalized Medical Patients after Inpatient Medicine Service Adoption of Mobile Secure Text Messaging, Journal of General Internal Medicine, 31 (8), pp. 863-870.
Mitesh S. Patel, David A. Asch, Roy Rosin, Dylan Small, Scarlett L. Bellamy, Kimberly Eberbach, Karen J. Walters, Nancy Haff, Samantha M. Lee, Lisa Wesby, Karen Hoffer, David Shuttleworth, Devon H. Taylor, Victoria Hilbert, Jingsan Zhu, Lin Yang, Xingmei Wang, Kevin G. Volpp (2016), Individual Versus Team-Based Financial Incentives to Increase Physical Activity: A Randomized, Controlled Trial, Journal of General Internal Medicine, 31 (7), pp. 746-754.
Teaching
Past Courses
BIOE999 - INDEPENDENT STUDY
This course is only open to students in the Master of Bioethics program.
EPID610 - TUTORIAL IN EPI RESEARCH
This is a tutorial given by each student's advisor. Advisor and student meet weekly. Topics include: discussion and review of epidemiologic concepts and principles, guided readings in the epidemiology of a specific health area, and the development of the research protocol.
EPID900 - MASTER'S THESIS
These are a series of tutorial sessions conducted by the student's advisor, which are to support the student's efforts in developing a research protocol, designing a designing a research project, and completing the study.
HCIN607 - TRANSLATING IDEAS
This course applies state-of-the-art innovation methodologies to improve health care delivery for providers, and outcomes and experience for patients. It begins with an extended discussion of how we might apply principles of analytical and scientific thinking including rhetorical analysis and behavioral economics to operational problems in health care. And it examines strategies for identifying and solving those problems; including ethnographic research to reveal what others have missed; problem reframing to enable high-impact solution directions; intentional divergence to unlock teams from initial, less productive concepts; rapid hypothesis validation to learn quickly at low cost whether and how best to invest in scaling; and designing delightful experiences, which drive word-of-mouth and catalyze the spread of desirable behaviors.
HCIN608 - VALUE & BENEFIT DESIGN
Recent efforts to increase the amount of health produced through health insurance benefits relative to the cost have utilized a number of strategies. These have included high deductible plans, price transparency, value-based insurance design, simplifying health plan designs, and providing incentives geared to influencing utilization. In this course, we will discuss some of the main challenges facing health insurers, efforts to reduce growth in entitlement spending, and research that focuses on the effectiveness of different strategies to modify behavior through the use of incentives embedded within health insurance design. This course will emphasize both understanding and practical applications of thisknowledge through a combination of lectures and interviews with expert practitioners. Following completion of this course, students will have a deeper understanding of some of the tradeoffs inherent in the approaches insurers are taking to provide greater value and health improvement for their beneficiaries.
HCMG203 - CLIN ISS IN HLTH CR MGMT
This course will explore the effects of the changing health care environment on the physician, patient and health care manager. It is intended for any undergraduate with an interest in how 1/6th of the American economy is organized as well as those planning careers as health care providers and managers. The course complements other health care courses (that take a societal perspective) by focusing on the individuals who participate in the health care enterprise. There are no prerequisites, as the course will stand on its own content. The course will be divided into modules that focus on the participants of the health care process and the process itself. We will analyze the patient, the doctor, and manager in light of the patient-doctor interaction, the turbulent health care marketplace, expensive new technologies,resource allocation, and ethics.
HPR 951 - HPR THESIS I
Each student completes a mentored research project that includes a thesis proposal and a thesis committee and results in a publishable scholarly product. Prerequisite: Course only open to Masters of Science in Health Policy Research students.
In the News
Knowledge @ Wharton
- With High-deductible Employer Health Plans, Who Wins?, Knowledge @ Wharton - 06/17/2019
- Why Wellness Programs Don’t Work So Well, Knowledge @ Wharton - 06/06/2018
- Less Logic, More Health: How Behavioral Economics Can Improve Incentives , Knowledge @ Wharton - 05/17/2016
Activity
Latest Research
In the News
With High-deductible Employer Health Plans, Who Wins?High-deductible employer health plans are cheaper for businesses and may also be cheaper for employees. But are they too much of a gamble?
Knowledge @ Wharton - 2019/06/17