Quantitative Health Sciences Calendar

Abstract: Massachusetts was one of the first states in the US to obtain a waiver to allow Medicaid to pay for nutrition and housing programs for medically complex members with food insecurity and housing insecurity. This presentation will focus on new research analyzing changes in hospitalizations, emergency department visits, and total costs of care among 30,000 Medicaid members who received services from 2020-2023 under the Flexible Services Program. 
Bio: Dr. Hager’s research focuses on structural determinants of health, food insecurity, and nutrition and health insurance policies. He is currently evaluating the Flexible Services Program, which addresses food and housing insecurity under Massachusetts’s Medicaid Section 1115 Waiver. Dr. Hager has training in nutritional epidemiology and his recent studies have included policy modeling, economic evaluations, and quasi-experimental studies.
Bio: Dr. Sabatino is a recent graduate of the Population Health Sciences program, where she contributed to data collection and analytic efforts for the independent evaluation of the Massachusetts Section 1115 Medicaid Demonstration. Her current research examines the effects of Medicaid policy reforms on health outcomes among low-income populations, with particular emphasis on individuals with behavioral health conditions.

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Abstract: Accurate and complete race/ethnicity data are central to measuring and reducing health inequities, but self-reported race/ethnicity data generally are incomplete for health plans. High-quality imputations are therefore critical. In this talk, we present a Bayesian machine learning imputation model that improves imputation accuracy compared to existing approaches by flexibly integrating information from all available data sources without being constrained by assumptions of linearity or additivity. Our method enables more precise measurement of inequities, ultimately enhancing the effectiveness of health equity programs. 
Bio: Dr. Mariel Finucane is the Director of Statistical Methods at Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts. She is a collaborative statistician and health services researcher, with expertise in heterogeneous treatment effects, generalizability, quality measurement, and Bayesian adaptive and factorial design. She has published widely, including first-author papers in the Journal of the American Statistical Association, Statistical Science, Statistical Methods in Medical Research, and the Journal of Evaluation; a first-author Lancet article on global trends in body mass index has been cited 6,000 times. Dr. Finucane holds a Ph.D. in biostatistics from the Harvard School of Public Health.

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