Health Economics: #14 Emerging Adults w Mental Illness
Dive into the intricate web of conflicting healthcare incentives. Dr. Wang explains how health economics guides resource allocation for better outcomes. About the Show Welcome to Health Hats, learning on the journey toward best health. I am Danny van Leeuwen, a two-legged, old, cisgender, white man with privilege, living in a food oasis, who can afford many hats and knows a little about a lot of healthcare and a lot about very little. Most people wear hats one at a time, but I wear them all at once. I’m the Rosetta Stone of Healthcare. We will listen and learn about what it takes to adjust to life’s realities in the awesome circus of healthcare. Let’s make some sense of all this. We respect Listeners, Watchers, and Readers . Show Notes at the end. Watch on YouTube Read Newsletter The same content as the podcast but not a verbatim transcript. Could be a book chapter with images. download the printable transcript here Contents Episode Proem Photo by Rodion Kutsaiev on UnSplash Several guests in this Emerging Adults with Mental Illness series discussed conflicting incentives. What does that even mean? Do incentives mean motivation? Why we do what we do? Are we talking about incentives for patients and caregivers, insurance companies, consultants, vendors, policymakers, clinicians, drug companies, pharmacy benefit companies, employers, or communities? In the last episode with Dr. Amanda Chue, we examined dynamic tensions. Incentives certainly cause tensions. Health Image created in DALL.E care is big business, with massive amounts of money involved, extremely fragmented systems within systems, and much power at stake. No wonder we think of conflicting incentives. The first health economist I knew personally was Jane Sarasohn-Kahn, of Health Populi fame . Full disclosure, Jane introduced me to blogging and suggested my name and brand, Health Hats. Introducing Dr. Yun (Sherry) Wang Photo by Francesco Gallarotti on UnSplash Our guest today is Dr. Yun Wang, who prefers Sherry. Dr. Wang is Assistant Professor in Health Economics and Outcomes Research at Chapman University School of Pharmacy. Before joining Chapman, she worked in global health, epidemiology, social science, clinical pharmacy, health economics, and health service research in Asia, Australia, and America. She is also an Alumni Affiliate at the Center for the Study of Race, Ethnicity & Equity, Washington University in St Louis. Her research interests lie in pharmacoepidemiology and health service research for substance users and chronic disease patients—a perfect guest for us. Podcast intro Welcome to Health Hats, the Podcast. I’m Danny van Leeuwen, a two-legged cisgender old white man of privilege who knows a little bit about a lot of healthcare and a lot about very little. We will listen and learn about what it takes to adjust to life’s realities in the awesome circus of healthcare. Let’s make some sense of all of this. Health Hats: Sherry, thank you so much for joining us today. I’m excited about this. We met a month or two ago, and I had been thinking about the health economics angle on emerging adults with mental illness and thinking about health economics. I realized I couldn’t explain it to people. I appreciate that you’re joining us. Tell us briefly about yourself. Sherry Wang: Thank you. I’m an assistant professor at the School of Pharmacy at Chapman University, located in a beautiful place, Orange County, California. We are very close to the beach, and we enjoy sunshine day by day. Don’t be jealous! Mental health research-it’s complicated I’m doing substance use research here. I’m attracted to mental health topics because mental health is not a single topic. Typically, it is combined with addiction—substance use. So, when I dive deeper into the people who abuse opioids, and Fentanyl. Fentanyl right now is the number one illegal drug in the United States, or even in the black market. People overdose and die from that. I feel sad about the truth we could not offer