Equity refers to the fairness of delivery, allocation of resources, and achievement of outcomes. Measures of health inequities quantify systematic disparities in health and healthcare between population groups with different levels of social disadvantage

What We Do

The Three Es Framework: Efficiency, Effectiveness and Equity

One important aspect in the discourse of attainment of equity in health and healthcare is the trade-off between the three Es: Efficiency, Effectiveness and Equity. Generally, efficiency measures how well the system is utilizing its resources and effectiveness is a measure of how well the system meets a need or achieves an objective. In our research projects, we use optimization models to account for the trade-off between the three Es in designing interventions to improve healthcare access and health outcomes.

Geographic Disparities

Research in uncovering geographic disparities has emerged as economic and social equity advocates recognized that where people live influences their opportunities for economic development, access to quality healthcare, and political participation. Within this research focus area, we study statistical and mathematical models that account for both time and regional variations along with identifying underlying contributors to inequities in health and healthcare. The goal is to build the foundation of measuring and monitoring equity in health, to ultimately improve decision making and fairness.

Publications

Journals

Heier Stamm, N. Serban, J. Swann, and P. Wortley (2017), “Quantifying and Explaining Accessibility of H1N1 Vaccine during the 2009 pandemic”, Health Care Management Science, 20(1), 76-93.

M. Nobles, N. Serban, J. Swann (2014), Spatial Accessibility of Pediatric Primary Healthcare: Measurement and Inference, Annals of Applied Statistics, 8 (4), 1922-1946.

Makram Talih (2013). A Reference-Invariant Health Disparity Index Based on Renyi Divergence, Annals of Applied Statistics, Vol. 7, No. 2, 1217–1243.

Braveman, P., & Gruskin, S. (2003). Defining Equity in Health. Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health, 57, 254-258.

Marsh, M. T., & Schilling, D. A. (1994). Equity measurement in facility location analysis: A review and framework. European Journal of Operational Research, 74, 1-17.

Rawls, J. (1971). A Theory of Justice. Cambridge MA: Harvard University Press.

Presentations

COLLABORATE: CDC and GT Workshop, Atlanta, GA. "Analytics for Public Health to Design Efficient, Effective, and Equitable Systems", J. Swann, March, 2014.

IIE Annual Conference, Montreal, Canada, "Quantifying and Explaining Access to H1N1 Vaccine", Heier Stamm, J., Serban, N., Swann, J., June, 2014.

Books

W. B. Rouse & N. Serban (2014). Understanding and Managing the Complexity of Healthcare. MIT Press

Equal opportunity to be healthy is the attainment by all people at the highest possible level of physical and mental well-being that biological limitations permit.
Braveman & Gruskin