This study investigates whether a novel type of social bond can pool resources across multiple competing health plans and create stable, long-term financing for interventions that address social determinants of health. The bond's design would allow multiple health plans participating in Minnesota’s Medicaid program to invest collectively in a fund that finances community-based interventions targeting social issues such as food insecurity, housing instability, transportation, and structural racism.

This study examines how the allocation of resources across medical, social, and public health services at the county level influences the relative success in controlling the progression of the COVID-19 pandemic. The project focuses on resource allocation decisions across sectors as a collective impact process that may influence the ability of organizations to cooperate effectively across sectors in responding to the pandemic.

This study tests how a transit system can enhance substance abuse treatment outcomes and reduce provider-level treatment costs for substance abuse amidst the opioid crisis in Connecticut. Increasing access and retention in treatment services is critical to improving health outcomes and reducing substance abuse overdose deaths. Using a difference-in-differences method, the research project will test how treatment costs differ before and after a new transit line and/or a change in transit service schedules.

Current health care payment methods do not reflect the need for effective chronic disease prevention, nor do they address the social determinants of health. Historically, common payment standards intended to link private healthcare providers with payers did not factor in coding or language to cover services provided by nonmedical personnel. Nonmedical personnel, specifically those in the social services sector, remain at a financial disadvantage relative to their peers.