Penn State Center for Health Care Policy and Research (CHCPR) director Dr Dennis Scanlon, Distinguished Professor of Health Policy and Administration, and faculty affiliate Dr. Yunfeng Shi, Associate Professor of Health Policy and Administration, published a study in Milbank Quarterly addressing the opaqueness of health care pricing in the United States.
Unlike most other markets for goods and services, health care prices are non-transparent and likely don’t represent the most efficient and low cost prices that consumers and payers seek. Increased consolidation through mergers and acquisitions in health care markets has exacerbated this problem. The paper offers several suggestions for how policymakers and regulators can change the status quo by looking beyond market share to catalyze a focus on increased production efficiency, innovation in care service delivery, and improvements in the quality of patient and population health management.
In the paper, “A Policy and Regulatory Framework to Promote Care Delivery Redesign and Production Efficiency in Health Care Markets”, Dr. Scanlon, Dr. Shi, and their collaborators proposed a Care Delivery Redesign (CDR) framework as a conceptual starting point for regulators and policymakers to develop incentives to encourage more innovation and efficiency in health care delivery.
A link to the full text of the article is here.
Scanlon DP, Harvey JB, Damberg CL, Bhagat PM, Shi Y. A Policy and Regulatory Framework to Promote Care Delivery Redesign and Production Efficiency in Health Care Markets. Milbank Q. 2025;103(2):316-348. doi:10.1111/1468-0009.70016