Higher costs for complex cancer surgery may be an indicator for worse, rather than better, quality of care, according to new research by the Baker Institute and the University of Texas MDAnderson Cancer Center. The study suggests that lower patient costs achieved by high-volume surgeons can be explained by the lower occurrence of “processes of care”— many of which are taken to avoid or treat complications that can occur during surgery, such as placing arterial lines or providing epidural anesthesia.
Vivian Ho, Marah Short, Thomas AloiaApril 21, 2017
The authors examine whether Italian scientists have experienced any religious shifts and how they went through these shifts, addressing personal secularization theories by analyzing whether and how scientists reconstruct their religious identities by utilizing science. Published by Philosophy, Theology and the Sciences
In this study, the authors examine the impact of consolidation among U.S. dialysis providers on: 1) the ability of patients to choose among competing dialysis providers and 2) the market concentration of providers in each hospital service area.
Texans are likely to pay more at freestanding emergency departments than at hospital-based emergency departments or urgent care centers, according to a study co-authored by Vivian Ho, the James A. Baker III Institute Chair in Health Economics and director of the Center for Health and Biosciences.
The authors rely on 40 in-depth interviews with male and female physicists at universities in China to determine why the country has so few women in physics — a discipline of science where there is extensive gender segregation.
Di Di, Elaine Howard Ecklund, Steven W. LewisJanuary 30, 2017
Drawing on interviews with male scientists working at prestigious universities, the authors report on ways these men negotiate the tensions between cultural expectations for devotion to work and breadwinning, either compromising work commitments for more time with family or time at home in exchange for increased academic prestige.
About 1 million Texans gained health care coverage due to the Affordable Care Act, according to new research by health policy fellows Vivian Ho and Elena Marks. The new findings published in the American Journal of Public Health examined the effects of the ACA’s Marketplace on Texas residents and determined which population subgroups benefited the most and the least.
Stephen Pickett, Elena M. Marks, Vivian HoDecember 7, 2016
Using national survey data the authors examine how the presence of religion in the workplace affects an individual’s perception of religious discrimination and how this effect varies by the religious tradition of the individual. Published by Review of Religious Research
Christopher Scheitle, Elaine Howard EcklundNovember 30, 2016
This study of biologists and physicists in the UK found that a majority of the respondents disagree with evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins’ “celebrity scientist” outreach approach and believe his work misrepresents science and the scientific research process.
Elaine Howard Ecklund, Kirstin R.W. MatthewsOctober 10, 2016