Lorens A. Helmchen, PhD
Assistant Professor, Health Policy and Administration, School of Public Health and Assistant Professor, Institute of Government and Public Affairs, University of Illinois at Chicago
Lorens A. Helmchen, PhD, is an Assistant Professor in the Division of Health Policy and Administration at the UIC School of Public Health and holds a joint appointment at the University's Institute of Government and Public Affairs. He teaches courses in health economics and microeconometrics.
In his research, Dr. Helmchen focuses on the optimal design of provider reimbursement and quality-revelation mechanisms in health care delivery. He is currently studying how full disclosure and rapid remedy of medical errors at the University of Illinois Medical Center at Chicago is affecting patients' propensity to sue and receive compensation.
As principal investigator on a pilot grant, Dr. Helmchen is examining the effect of a pay-for-performance initiative on physicians' practice patterns and their compliance with treatment guidelines.
In a third project, Dr. Helmchen is investigating how the introduction of consumer-directed health insurance plans affects provider choice, health care utilization, and outcomes.
Dr. Helmchen has published on the measurement and evaluation of charity care provision by non-profit hospitals. As co-principal investigator on a Center for Health Management Research project, he is studying the impact of specialty hospitals and ambulatory surgery centers on the continued ability of incumbent general hospitals to provide community benefits.
Dr. Helmchen earned a PhD in economics from the University of Chicago in 2004 and an M.A. in economics from Humboldt University in Berlin, Germany. He also spent a year as a visiting student at the Ecole Nationale de la Statistique et de l'Administration Economique in Paris, France, and a year at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He is a member of the Cohort Studies Working Group at the National Bureau of Economic Research and an Adjunct Senior Fellow of the Leonard Davis Institute of Health Economics at the University of Pennsylvania.
Lorens A. Helmchen will be a panelist on the Session A panel, Changes in the Process of Aging During the Twentieth Century, at this year's Management Conference.
