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

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

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).
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.
Mitesh S. Patel, Kevin G. Volpp, Roy Rosin, Scarlett L. Bellamy, Dylan Small, Michele A. Fletcher, Rosemary Osman-Koss, Jennifer L. Brady, 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 (2016), A Randomized Trial of Social Comparison Feedback and Financial Incentives to Increase Physical Activity, American Journal of Health Promotion, 30 (6), pp. 416-424.
Scott Halpern, Benjamin French, Dylan Small, Kathryn Saulsgiver, Michael Harhay, Janet Audrain-McGovern, George Loewenstein, Troyen Brennan, David A. Asch, Kevin Volpp (2015), Randomized Trial of Four Financial-Incentive Programs for Smoking Cessation, New England Journal of Medicine, 372, pp. 2108-2117.
Benjamin French, Dylan Small, Julie Novak, Kathryn Saulsgiver, Michael Harhay, David A. Asch, Kevin Volpp, Scott Halpern (2015), Preference-Adaptive Randomization in Comparative Effectiveness Studies, Trials, 16 (99), pp. 1-9.
Raina M. Merchant, Heather Griffis, Yoonhee P. Ha, Austin Kilaru, Allison Sellers, John C. Hershey, Shawndra Hill, Emily Kramer-Golinkoff, Lindsay Nadkarni, Margaret Debski, Kevin Padrez, Lance B. Becker, David A. Asch (2014), Hidden in Plain Sight: A Crowdsourced Public Art Contest to Make Automated External Defibrillators More Visible, American Journal of Public Health,, 104, pp. 2306-2312.
Charlene Wong, David A. Asch, Cjloe Vinoya, Carol Ford, Robert J. Town, Raina M. Merchant (2014), The Experience of Young Adults on HealthCare.gov: Suggestions for Improvement, Annals of Internal Medicine , 161 (3), pp. 231-232.

Teaching

Past Courses

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.

Activity

Latest Research

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).

All Research