Economic Evaluation Methods

Every day, we hear about the staggering toll of the opioid overdose crisis. This is particularly salient in Philadelphia, which has one of the highest overdose death rates among major U.S. cities. Despite effective medications for opioid use disorder, such as buprenorphine and methadone, few people receive treatment. The ongoing challenge is to expand access to these lifesaving treatments […]

The intersection of criminal justice-involved populations and people who use substances makes criminal justice outcomes particularly significant for estimating the economic impact of substance use disorder interventions. New National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) HEAL initiative funding opportunities in response to the opioid crisis include integrated studies that will develop, test, and validate evidence-based approaches to preventing […]

One key strategy in reducing deaths from the opioid epidemic is to improve access to existing evidence-based treatments. Two new economic studies by CHERISH Investigators Drs. Sean Murphy, Kathryn McCollister, and Bruce Schackman can help providers, patients, and payers sort through alternative pharmacotherapies to prevent opioid relapse. The US Food and Drug Administration has approved […]

On March 19, researchers from institutions across the country joined CHERISH leaders Bruce Schackman, Kathryn McCollister, Benjamin Linas and Sean Murphy for a daylong CHERISH introductory training to economic evaluations. Dr. Schackman began the day by introducing CHERISH to the attendees, who represented more than 25 institutions across New England, the Midwest, the Mid-Atlantic, the South […]

The National Institute on Drug Abuse estimates that substance use disorders, comprising illicit drugs and alcohol use as well as smoking, cost the United States more than $740 billion per year. This includes the cost of crime, incarceration, lost productivity, and medical care. A recent study considered the economic consequences of heroin use specifically, finding […]

The US Panel on Cost-Effectiveness in Health and Medicine issued a report in 1996 that set the standards for reporting of cost-effectiveness studies in the field, resulting in a rapid expansion of publications and establishment of similar national standards in other jurisdictions. Twenty years later, the Second Panel on Cost-Effectiveness in Health and Medicine has […]

Dr. McCollister is an Associate Professor and Health Economist in the Department Public Health Sciences at the University Of Miami Miller School Of Medicine. She is the Co-Director of the CHERISH Methodology Core. This interview discusses her interest in substance use health economics and her most recent publication “Cost Effectiveness analysis of a continuing care […]

There are more deaths in the US from opioids than from any other unintentional injury–one person died every 30 minutes from an opioid analgesic overdose in the US in 2014. The experience of living with opioid use is harmful both for the opioid user and for his or her spouse. A recent study published in the journal Addiction quantified […]