A Health Podyssey

Health Affairs' Rob Lott interviews Brendan Saloner of Brown University about his recent paper exploring how scaling up opioid treatment and harm reduction programs could reach more people. Order the September 2025 issue of Health Affairs.Currently, more than 70 percent of our content is freely available - and we'd like to keep it that way. With your support, we can continue to keep our digital publication Forefront and podcast for everyone.

On August 12, A Health Podyssey's Rob Lott chatted with Kenton Johnston of Washington University about his paper in the August 2025 edition of Health Affairs that explores changes in clinician's participation across Medicare value-based payment models.Order the August 2025 issue of Health Affairs. Currently, more than 70 percent of our content is freely available - and we'd like to keep it that way. With your support, we can continue to keep our digital publication Forefront and podcasts free for everyone.

Health Affairs' Rob Lott interviews Cal Chengqi Fang of the University of Chicago about his recent paper that explores how pay gaps grew between nonprofit hospital CEOs and employees from 2009–23. Order the August 2025 issue of Health Affairs.Currently, more than 70 percent of our content is freely available - and we'd like to keep it that way. With your support, we can continue to keep our digital publication Forefront and podcast for everyone.

Health Affairs' Rob Lott interviews Jonathan Perlin of The Joint Commission about the origins of this commission, the impacts made on health care through quality improvement and patient safety, the role of accreditation, the public policy levers that drive change, and more. Currently, more than 70 percent of our content is freely available - and we'd like to keep it that way. With your support, we can continue to keep our digital publication Forefront and podcast for everyone.

Health Affairs' Rob Lott interviews Margaret Sieger of the University of Kansas Medical Center about her recent paper that reviews how Connecticut's novel prenatal substance exposure policy was associated with declining Child Protective Services reports and foster placements. Order the July 2025 issue of Health Affairs.Currently, more than 70 percent of our content is freely available - and we'd like to keep it that way. With your support, we can continue to keep our digital publication Forefront and podcast for everyone.

Health Affairs' Rob Lott interviews J. Wyatt Koma of Harvard University about his recent paper that explores enrollment trends and characteristics of low-income beneficiaries within Medicare Savings Programs.Order the July 2025 issue of Health Affairs.Currently, more than 70 percent of our content is freely available - and we'd like to keep it that way. With your support, we can continue to keep our digital publication Forefront and podcast for everyone.

Health Affairs' Rob Lott interviews Bohan Li of Harvard University about her recent paper that explores substantial shifts in market landscape and acquisitions in Medicaid managed care.Order the July 2025 issue of Health Affairs.Currently, more than 70 percent of our content is freely available - and we'd like to keep it that way. With your support, we can continue to keep our digital publication Forefront and podcast for everyone.

Health Affairs' Rob Lott interviews Paula Chatterjee of the University of Pennsylvania about her recent paper that explores whether or not rural hospitals saw financial improvements from participation in the Pennsylvania Rural Health Model.Order the July 2025 issue of Health Affairs.Currently, more than 70 percent of our content is freely available - and we'd like to keep it that way. With your support, we can continue to keep our digital publication Forefront and podcast for everyone.

Health Affairs' Rob Lott interviews Uché Blackstock, CEO and Founder of Advancing Health Equity (AHE), on her experiences founding AHE in 2019, the mission statement of the organization to pursue health equity in health care, and her generational memoir, LEGACY: A Black Physician Reckons with Racism in Medicine. Currently, more than 70 percent of our content is freely available - and we'd like to keep it that way. With your support, we can continue to keep our digital publication Forefront and podcast for everyone.

In this discussion, Robert Burke, a hospitalist and associate professor at the University of Pennsylvania, delves into his recent research on value-based purchasing programs for skilled nursing facilities. He highlights the crucial transition from hospitals to these facilities and addresses the emotional toll on older adults during this shift. Burke reveals that many quality improvement efforts show limited impact on patient outcomes, often resulting in penalties for facilities instead of incentives. He also uncovers significant gaps in communication that hinder program effectiveness.