Bio
Ashley Leech is an assistant professor in the Department of Health Policy at Vanderbilt University School of Medicine. Her PhD and postdoctoral training are in health services research and health economics, with a specialized focus on decision science. Her research is dedicated to improving the delivery of high-value healthcare for reproductive-age women and their infants, particularly during pre-conception planning, pregnancy, and postnatal care.
She is the Principal Investigator of an NIH/NIDA-funded career development award on Advancing Treatment Outcomes for Pregnant Individuals with Opioid Use Disorder where she is employing mathematical simulation modeling to measure long-term tradeoffs in opioid medication use for pregnant persons and their infants, while also considering how resource constraints might alter optimal solutions to health services. As part of this research, she leverages large healthcare claims data to assess medication use, safety, and efficacy for pregnant persons and their infants.