Visiting professors add to the dynamic of a research environment. The Department of Health Care Policy is currently hosting two: Frank Levy, PhD, the Daniel Rose Professor of Urban Economics in the MIT Department of Urban Studies and Planning; and Peter Kemper, PhD, Professor of Health Policy and Administration and Demography at Pennsylvania State University. Kemper is at HCP for the spring semester; Levy is here for a full year, in part on an investigator’s grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.

Much of Levy’s work as a labor economist concerns how computer technology and, more recently, sending work offshore affect the labor market. He is coauthor, with Richard J. Murnane, PhD, of the Harvard Graduate School of Education, of The New Division of Labor: How Computers Are Creating the Next Job Market. He has also been studying the economics of radiology, and it is this work that is his focus at HCP.

Levy is examining the overutilization of medical imaging and its impact on rising medical costs. Why have medical imaging and the associated costs grown so much? Are the initiatives intended to decrease the use of inappropriate imaging effective? In looking for the answers to these questions, he’s come to understand that the uncertainty surrounding medical imaging—when it should be performed and how accurate the readings are—weakens the basis for professional judgment and increases the role of financial incentives.

Because this research relates to health care, HCP is the perfect fit. The department offers unique resources that drew Levy here for his sabbatical. At HCP, he says, he benefits from the exposure to the department’s health economists, as well as from its location in a major medical area. Conversations with HCP faculty members—HCP Head Barbara J. McNeil, MD, PhD, herself a radiologist, and the department’s economists—have proven helpful for offering perspective and guiding him toward the sources and data he needs to carry out his research.

“It’s important to work with people who know what’s out there,” he says. Levy appreciates having “a great set of colleagues who are always open to talking and sharing their knowledge,” despite their own heavy workloads. What brought Kemper to HCP is the quality and reputation of the department, as well as its strong researchers in long-term care. Kemper’s research at Penn State encompasses a number of subjects, including the effect of public financing of home care for the elderly on cost and quality-of-life outcomes, and understanding the lifetime risk of disability and use of long-term care.

At HCP, he is continuing research on the paraprofessional workforce that provides long-term care, such as certified nursing assistants and home health aides. Apart from family members, these caregivers provide most of the direct care to the elderly and disabled, but these jobs are low paying and stressful. Based on data he’s collected, he’s currently evaluating the effectiveness of a demonstration designed to improve the job, reduce turnover, and ultimately improve care.

In his interactions with faculty members David C. Grabowski, PhD, with whom he serves on a committee for an AcademyHealth initiative on long-term care; Haiden A. Huskamp, PhD; and David G. Stevenson, SM, PhD, he’s received useful feedback from their comments on his research. He has also benefited from HCP’s access to outside speakers; he has attended some postdoc seminars as well. Kemper has especially appreciated the strong collaborative culture that exists in HCP.

HCP benefits from the visiting professors’ presence, as they conduct informal discussions with HCP faculty members about their own research. During his time here, Kemper also gave a talk about his research on paraprofessional workers to HCP faculty and Robert Wood Johnson Foundation postdoctoral fellows: “Evaluating a ‘Let a Thousand Flowers Bloom’ Demonstration: Changing Management Practices to Improve Direct Care Jobs in Long-Term Care.”
Kemper appreciates “the opportunity to conduct my sabbatical research in this supportive environment among first-rate faculty who are highly committed to the enterprise and to observe how the leading researchers in the top university in health care policy go about their business.” He’ll bring these observations with him when he returns to Penn State and hopes to continue to interact with faculty working on long-term care here. Levy, too, says he will continue to benefit from his time at HCP, as the relationships he’s forged will carry forward for years to come.

McNeil is enthusiastic about the presence of sabbatical visitors at HCP. “It increases our knowledge about work being done elsewhere and gives us an opportunity to know our colleagues from other universities better,” she says. “Visitors also provide insight into work conducted at HCP.”