Profiles

Austin B. Frakt, PhD

Research Professor, Health Law, Policy & Management - Boston University School of Public Health

Talbot

Biography

Austin Frakt, Ph.D., is a Health Economist and Director of the Partnered Evidence-based Policy Resource Center at the Boston VA Healthcare System. He is also a Professor of Health Law, Policy & Management with the Boston University School of Public Health and a Principal Research Scientist with the Department of Health Policy and Management at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.

Dr. Frakt is Editor-in-Chief of Health Services Research and serves on the editorial board of the American Journal of Managed Care.
He is also an Editor-in-Chief and a primary author of the evidence-based health policy blog The Incidental Economist.

Dr. Frakt has conducted research studies funded by the Department of Veterans Affairs, the National Institute on Aging, The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, The Commonwealth Fund, the Laura and John Arnold Foundation, and the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality. His work has been published in The New England Journal of Medicine, Journal of the American Medical Association, Milbank Quarterly, Health Care Financing Review, Health Affairs, Health Economics, Health Services Research, International Journal of Health Care Finance and Economics, Journal of Health Politics, Policy and Law, among other journals.

Dr. Frakt received his Ph.D. from the Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Department of Massachusetts Institute of Technology in statistical and applied mathematics. He also received a master’s degree from MIT, and his bachelor’s degree from Cornell University in Applied and Engineering Physics.

Other Positions

Visiting Associate Professor - Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health

Education

Massachusetts Institute of Technology, PhD Field of Study: Electrical Engineering
Cornell University, BS
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, SM/ScM Field of Study: Electrical Engineering

Websites

Publications

Published on 3/5/2023
Frakt A, Tachibana C. From the Editor's Desk: Publishing in HSR in 2021. Health Serv Res. 2023 Mar 05. PMID: 36872309.
Read At: PubMed

Published on 2/20/2023
Frakt A, Tachibana C. HSR's outstanding reviewers in 2022. Health Serv Res. 2023 Apr; 58(2):241. PMID: 36746612.
Read At: PubMed

Published on 2/3/2023
Beckman AL, Frakt AB, Duggan C, Zheng J, Orav EJ, Tsai TC, Figueroa JF. Evaluation of Potentially Avoidable Acute Care Utilization Among Patients Insured by Medicare Advantage vs Traditional Medicare. JAMA Health Forum. 2023 Feb 03; 4(2):e225530. PMID: 36826828.
Read At: PubMed

Published on 1/31/2023
Richerson JT, Wagner TH, Abrams T, Skelton K, Biswas K, Illarmo S, McSherry F, Fallon MT, Frakt A, Pizer S, Magruder KM, Groer S, Dorn PA, Huang GD, Stock EM. Therapeutic and Economic Benefits of Service Dogs Versus Emotional Support Dogs for Veterans With PTSD. Psychiatr Serv. 2023 Jan 31; appips20220138. PMID: 36718602.
Read At: PubMed

Published on 12/10/2022
Auty SG, Barr KD, Frakt AB, Garrido MM, Strombotne KL. Effect of a Veterans Health Administration mandate to case review patients with opioid prescriptions on mortality among patients with opioid use disorder: a secondary analysis of the STORM randomized control trial. Addiction. 2022 Dec 10. PMID: 36495477.
Read At: PubMed

Published on 11/1/2022
Whaley C, Frakt A. If Patients Don't Use Available Health Service Pricing Information, Is Transparency Still Important? AMA J Ethics. 2022 Nov 01; 24(11):E1056-1062. PMID: 36342488.
Read At: PubMed

Published on 8/19/2022
Garrido MM, Jones DK, Woodruff A, Strombotne K, Palani S, Zahakos S, Adelberg M, Pizer SD, Frakt AB. Detecting fraud, waste, and abuse in substance use disorder treatment. Health Serv Res. 2022 Oct; 57(5):997-1000. PMID: 35932224.
Read At: PubMed

Published on 6/17/2022
Minegishi T, Garrido MM, Lewis ET, Oliva EM, Pizer SD, Strombotne KL, Trafton JA, Tenso K, Sohoni PS, Frakt AB. Randomized Policy Evaluation of the Veterans Health Administration Stratification Tool for Opioid Risk Mitigation (STORM). J Gen Intern Med. 2022 Nov; 37(14):3746-3750. PMID: 35715661.
Read At: PubMed

Published on 6/1/2022
Patel SY, Huskamp HA, Frakt AB, Auerbach DI, Neprash HT, Barnett ML, James HO, Mehrotra A. Frequency Of Indirect Billing To Medicare For Nurse Practitioner And Physician Assistant Office Visits. Health Aff (Millwood). 2022 Jun; 41(6):805-813. PMID: 35666969.
Read At: PubMed

Published on 5/2/2022
Strombotne KL, Legler A, Minegishi T, Trafton JA, Oliva EM, Lewis ET, Sohoni P, Garrido MM, Pizer SD, Frakt AB. Effect of a Predictive Analytics-Targeted Program in Patients on Opioids: a Stepped-Wedge Cluster Randomized Controlled Trial. J Gen Intern Med. 2023 Feb; 38(2):375-381. PMID: 35501628.
Read At: PubMed

View 170 more publications:View Full Profile at BUMC

News & In the Media

Published on July 28, 2022
Tips for Black Male Self Care -Beating the Odds of Premature Death in America
Published on December 20, 2021
Another Harm from Guns: Lead Exposure
Published on December 7, 2021
Health Care Access Is Hampered By Administrative Hurdles
Published on November 8, 2021
Faculty Profile: Austin Frakt
Published on June 16, 2021
Substance Use Disorder Treatment Centers: Uncovering Fraud and Advancing Policies to Promote Best Practices
Published on April 21, 2021
What’s behind the Rise in US Alcohol Consumption?
Published on April 21, 2021
What’s behind America’s Growth in Alcohol Consumption?
Published on April 20, 2021
What’s behind the Growth in Alcohol Consumption?
Published on March 18, 2021
Professor Named Editor-in-Chief of Health Services Research
Published on February 11, 2021
Drug Prices by Committee: One Way Biden Could Lower Costs
Published on February 11, 2021
What Can Be Learned from Differing Rates of Suicide among Groups
Published on December 3, 2020
Pointers From Portugal on Addiction and the Drug War
Published on December 3, 2020
Improve Emergency Care? Pandemic Helps Point the Way
Published on December 3, 2020
The Shift to Telemedicine May Improve Emergency Health Care.
Published on December 2, 2020
Viewpoint: How Telemedicine May Reshape Emergency Medicine
Published on October 28, 2020
Can the ACA Cover Everyone?
Published on August 26, 2020
The Fine Line Between Choice and Confusion in Health Care
Published on August 5, 2020
CDC: US Could Prevent Two-Thirds of Maternal Deaths
Published on July 13, 2020
What’s Missing in the Effort to Stop Maternal Deaths
Published on July 6, 2020
How to Think about Pregnancy Risks
Published on July 6, 2020
Putting a Dollar Value on Life? Governments Already Do
Published on May 12, 2020
Putting a Dollar Value on Life? Governments Already Do
Published on April 23, 2020
How the COVID-19 Pandemic Will Leave Its Mark on US Health Care
Published on April 17, 2020
Can Churches Bring Addiction Treatment to Rural Areas?
Published on April 15, 2020
Damage from Oxycontin Continues to Be Revealed
Published on April 6, 2020
These Two Coronavirus Maps Provide a Terrifying Glimpse of What’s Coming
Published on March 26, 2020
Who Should Be Saved First? Experts Offer Ethical Guidance
Published on March 12, 2020
Alcoholics Anonymous vs. Other Approaches: The Evidence Is Now In
Published on March 6, 2020
What Economists Would Change — and Keep — about the US Health Care System
Published on March 4, 2020
Assessing ACA Payment Reform at 10 Years
Published on February 20, 2020
NYT: How Health Economists Would Fix the Healthcare System
Published on February 19, 2020
The History behind Black Men’s Poor Health Outcomes, and What We Can Do to Close the Gap
Published on February 18, 2020
The Health System We’d Have If Economists Ran Things
Published on February 6, 2020
Health Care Price Transparency to Become Requirement
Published on February 5, 2020
America’s Healthcare System Is a Costly Mess
Published on February 3, 2020
Would Your Wages Rise under ‘Medicare for All’?
Published on January 16, 2020
Race and Medicine: The Harm That Comes from Mistrust
Published on January 16, 2020
Morning Break: Opioid Distributor Quits; Why Isn’t Concierge Catching On?
Published on January 10, 2020
Reduce Health Costs by Nurturing the Sickest? A Much-Touted Idea Disappoints
Published on January 10, 2020
Promising Idea to Cut Health-Care Costs Fizzles in Major Study
Published on January 10, 2020
‘Hot Spotting’ Doesn’t Work. So What Does?
Published on January 9, 2020
Reduce Health Costs by Nurturing the Sickest? A Much-Touted Idea Disappoints
Published on January 2, 2020
How Cutting Food Stamps Can Add Costs Elsewhere
Published on December 9, 2019
We Beat Sleep Apnea. It Should Be Easier for You to Do It, Too.
Published on December 6, 2019
If Pain Is an Opinion, There Are Ways to Change Your Mind
Published on December 4, 2019
If ‘Pain Is an Opinion,’ There Are Ways to Change Your Mind
Published on December 4, 2019
If ‘Pain Is an Opinion,’ There Are Ways to Change Your Mind
Published on November 27, 2019
Racial Disparities in Pain Prescriptions Kept Thousands of Black Patients Alive
Published on November 26, 2019
Sleep Can Be Good for Your Salary
Published on November 26, 2019
A ‘Rare Case Where Racial Biases’ Protected African-Americans
Published on November 26, 2019
A New Hub for Serious Discourse
Published on November 21, 2019
The Huge Amount of Waste in the US Health System
Published on November 21, 2019
Health Industry Expects Little Change from Heart Study
Published on October 23, 2019
How Exercise Could Prevent Senile Dementia
Published on October 16, 2019
The Huge Waste in the US Health System
Published on October 16, 2019
Health Care’s Biggest Problem Is Getting Worse
Published on October 11, 2019
Austin Frakt: Rampant Waste in Health System
Published on October 9, 2019
Different Takes: Dems Need to Shake Up Stale Debate on Health Care; Trump Works On His Twofer to Destroy Health Care and Immigration Systems
Published on October 8, 2019
Column: Trump Runs Dry on Healthcare Ideas, Promotes Wellness Programs Known to Be Useless⁠
Published on September 26, 2019
‘Value’ of Care Was a Big Goal. How Did It Work Out?
Published on September 4, 2019
Why Doctors Still Offer Treatments That May Not Help
Published on September 4, 2019
Chart of the Day: Doctors Are Just Winging It
Published on September 4, 2019
Viewpoints: Varied Look at Healthcare
Published on August 8, 2019
Myth Diagnosis: Do Hospitals Charge More to Make Up for Low Government Pay?
Published on August 6, 2019
Hospital Mergers Don’t Cut Prices
Published on July 29, 2019
A Question Rarely Asked: What Would Medicare for All Cover?
Published on July 16, 2019
There Is No Single, Best Policy for Drug Prices
Published on July 11, 2019
Even Researchers Don’t Know Which Doctors Medicare Advantage Covers
Published on July 11, 2019
Google Search More Accurate than Medicare Advantage Directories, Study Finds
Published on July 1, 2019
Debunking Medical Myths All in a Day’s Work for IU’s Dr. Aaron Carroll
Published on June 27, 2019
Can Marijuana Help Cure the Opioid Crisis?
Published on June 12, 2019
Veteran-Directed Care Program Is Effective
Published on June 7, 2019
Keeping Hospital Market Competitive Is an Uphill Battle for FTC
Published on June 3, 2019
How Much Does Your Education Level Affect Your Health?
Published on June 3, 2019
Is Our Health Care Spending Worth It?
Published on June 3, 2019
Medicare for All: Beware of Mutants
Published on May 7, 2019
Medicare for All: Accept No Substitutes
Published on May 7, 2019
Why Your Doctor’s White Coat Can Be a Threat to Your Health
Published on April 15, 2019
Healing Your Feet, and Finding a Balance in Following Doctor’s Orders
Published on April 12, 2019
Brainstorm Health: Universal Health Care vs. Innovation, Addyi Alcohol Risk, Ohio Abortion Bill
Published on April 11, 2019
Why Some Health System Merger Plans Work Out But Others Are Nixed and Why You Should Care
Published on April 10, 2019
What Does Opioid Use Disorder Treatment Fraud Look Like?
Published on April 4, 2019
What Role Should Physicians Play in Healthcare’s Move Toward Price Transparency?
Published on April 1, 2019
Medicare Advantage Networks Are Broad and Getting Broader
Published on March 22, 2019
Betsy McCaughey: With Medicare for All, ‘Doctors Will Avoid Seniors like the Plague’
Published on March 18, 2019
When Email Comes to the Doctor’s Office, Wait Times Decrease
Published on March 15, 2019
How Healthcare IT Can Help Consumers with Health Choices
Published on March 14, 2019
More Data Needed on What Works in Healthcare, Expert Says
Published on March 8, 2019
Who Has the Best Healthcare System in the World?
Published on March 6, 2019
Are Patients Consumers or Not?
Published on March 6, 2019
Does Restricting Prescription Opioids Save Lives in the Long Term?
Published on March 4, 2019
The Opioid Dilemma: Saving Lives in the Long Run Can Take Lives in the Short Run
Published on March 1, 2019
Build Your Own ‘Medicare for All’ Plan. Beware: There Are Tough Choices.
Published on February 28, 2019
Many Seniors Need Hearing Aids. Why Doesn’t Medicare Cover Them?
Published on February 22, 2019
The Difference Between a ‘Public Option’ and ‘Medicare for All’? Let’s Define Our Terms
Published on February 12, 2019
Why Hospital Mergers May Harm Care Quality
Published on February 11, 2019
Ever Tried Telling a Teen to Stop Juuling? These Experts Have a Tip
Published on February 7, 2019
Is Employer-Sponsored Insurance Really a Good Deal for Workers?
Published on February 7, 2019
La salud mundial avanza a pasos agigantados, pero podría ser mejor
Published on February 4, 2019
Giant Strides in World Health, but It Could Be So Much Better
Published on January 28, 2019
Stuck and Stressed: The Health Costs of Traffic
Published on January 8, 2019
Why a ‘Passive’ Health Approach Can Produce the Most Action
Published on January 4, 2019
Critics Who Want to Cut Drug Prices Must Say Which Ones
Published on January 2, 2019
Why Do Elderly Americans Have Swiss Cheese Coverage?
Published on January 2, 2019
The Most-Shared Health Affairs Articles of 2018
Published on December 17, 2018
The Medicare-for-All Paradox
Published on December 5, 2018
Why Do Hospitals Hate Sleep So Much?
Published on December 3, 2018
Why Hospitals Should Let You Sleep
Published on December 3, 2018
How Pollution Can Hurt the Health of the Economy
Published on December 3, 2018
Something Happened to U.S. Drug Costs in the 1990s
Published on December 3, 2018
NYT Shows Link Between Innovations and High Drug Prices
Published on November 15, 2018
Drug Spending Is High Because Prices Are High
Published on November 13, 2018
What’s Behind Soaring Drug Prices in the US?
Published on November 8, 2018
Rural Hospitals and Medicaid’s Trick Bag
Published on October 31, 2018
A Sense of Alarm as Rural Hospitals Keep Closing
Published on October 31, 2018
With Trump Administration Rollbacks, Drilling Rigs Alter Western Landscapes
Published on October 19, 2018
Podcast: KHN’s ‘What the Health?’ Republicans’ Preexisting Political Problem
Published on October 12, 2018
How a CVS-Aetna Merger Might Actually Put Money in Your Pocket
Published on October 3, 2018
Vitals
Published on September 13, 2018
Although We’re Running Low on Doctors, the Solution May Not Be More Doctors
Published on September 5, 2018
What the Experts Want Us to Know about Public Health
Published on August 31, 2018
A Little-Known Windfall for Some Hospitals, Now Facing Big Cuts
Published on August 14, 2018
The Large Hidden Costs of Medicare’s Prescription Drug Program
Published on August 6, 2018
ACA Policy Changes, Economic Factors Influence Use of VA Services
Published on July 30, 2018
Shopping for Health Care Simply Doesn’t Work. So What Might?
Published on July 18, 2018
The Astonishingly High Administrative Costs of U.S. Health Care
Published on July 18, 2018
Evidence to Support ‘Breakthrough’ Drugs Often Very Limited: Study
Published on July 18, 2018
Drugs Approved More Quickly Have Less Robust Clinical Trials
Published on July 11, 2018
Sometimes Patients Simply Need Other Patients
Published on July 11, 2018
How Peer-to-Peer Healthcare Can Ease Patient Anxiety
Published on June 25, 2018
America Has a Health Care Gap, and Insurance Alone Won’t Fix It
Published on June 13, 2018
Private Equity’s Thirst for Health Care Providers
Published on June 12, 2018
Can Low-Intensity Care Solve High Health Care Costs?
Published on June 4, 2018
Reagan, Deregulation and America’s Exceptional Rise in Health Care Costs
Published on June 4, 2018
The Next Great American Public Health Campaign? Readers Make Their Picks
Published on May 29, 2018
It Saves Lives. It Can Save Money. So Why Aren’t We Spending More on Public Health?
Published on May 28, 2018
We Need a Cure for Runaway Drug Prices — But Not the One Trump Is Prescribing
Published on May 21, 2018
Solving the Mystery of American Health Spending after 1980, Part 1: Out-of-Pocket Spending
Published on May 17, 2018
America’s Dismal Turning Point
Published on May 16, 2018
Medical Mystery: Something Happened to US Health Spending after 1980
Published on May 10, 2018
When an Infected Tooth Becomes Much More
Published on April 30, 2018
Worried About Risky Teenage Behavior? Make School Tougher
Published on April 30, 2018
A Data Dump That Could Make a Difference in Health Care
Published on April 16, 2018
Would Americans Accept Putting Health Care on a Budget?
Published on April 2, 2018
The US Faces an Impending Dental Care Crisis
Published on March 21, 2018
Viewpoint: Hospitals Don’t Want an All-Payer System
Published on March 19, 2018
Medicare Doesn’t Equal Dental Care. That Can Be a Big Problem

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