Prenatal Opioid Exposure, Neonatal Abstinence/Opioid Withdrawal Syndrome: Healthcare Utilization, Costs, and Economic Burden

Ali Jalali examined healthcare resource utilization patterns and Medicaid costs for pregnant women with opioid use disorder, infants with and without exposure to opioids in utero, and infants with and without neonatal opioid withdrawal syndrome (NOWS). He used data from the Medicaid and Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) Transformed Medicaid Statistical Information System (T-MSIS), which will provide the opportunity to generate nationally representative Medicaid unit costs for healthcare services. This study addresses knowledge gaps regarding pregnant women with opioid use disorder and their infants, and will be the first study to provide Medicaid healthcare resource unit cost estimates for these women and infants for future economic evaluations.

Ali Jalali is an assistant professor of population health sciences at the Joan and Sanford I. Weill Medical College of Cornell University. Prior to joining Weill Cornell Medicine, Jalali completed a doctoral degree in economics from the University of Utah, and received training as a health economist in the Health Economics Core of the Center for Clinical and Translational Sciences, University of Utah School of Medicine. His research interests include the social determinants of health, economic dimensions of substance use disorders, impact of labor market policies on population health, and the societal burden of preterm births and rare genetic disorders. Jalali has also researched the impact of bundled payment reforms on physician consolidation, the provision of adequate surgical care in lower and middle-income countries (particularly Ghana), and cost-effectiveness analysis of universal newborn screening for genetic disorders.