HERC Seminar: Developing New Policies in Response to Rising Drug Prices in the U.S.

Abstract

The U.S. prescription drug market has faced dramatic price increases over the past several years, drawing attention to a number of generic and specialty drug price hikes. Existing U.S. policies fail to protect against these price hikes, and in most cases are legal. Several policies in particular, including the Orphan Drug Act (1983), the Hatch-Waxman Act (1984) for generic Pharmaceutical entry, and the Medicare Modernization Act (2003) do more to incentivize price hikes today than protect consumers. These actions have left the chronically comorbid and indigent patients most vulnerable. With data from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and Truven Marketscan, we explored the impact that these policies have had on pharmaceutical pricing using cost-effectiveness analysis and multilevel regression modeling. We have found that small revisions to the aforementioned policies, if enacted simultaneously, could significantly reduce and control pricing in the pharmaceutical market without deterring pharmaceutical innovation.

Biography

William Padula is an Assistant Professor of Health Economics in the Department of Health Policy and Management at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, USA, with joint appointments in the Bloomberg School of Public Health, School of Medicine, and School of Nursing. His research explores methodological issues in health economics and health services research with a focus on the theoretical foundations of medical cost-effectiveness analysis to emphasize the importance of quality improvement in hospital care. He has also begun studying policy issues related to increased pricing of generic and specialty drugs. His work has led to passage of new laws in Maryland, USA to control generic price hikes. Prior to joining Hopkins, he served a postdoctoral fellowship in health economics at University of Chicago where he received a National Research Service Award from the U.S. Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) to develop predictive algorithms of patient risk for developing hospital-acquired pressure ulcers. He earned a PhD in Pharmaceutical Outcomes Research from the University of Colorado, as well as MS degrees in Analytics from University of Chicago and in Evaluative Clinical Science from Dartmouth College. His BS in Chemical Engineering is from Northwestern University. He is the recipient of the Academy Health Outstanding Dissertation Award of 2015, as well as honored as Annals of Internal Medicine best reviewer four times between 2013 and 2016. He is currently a Visiting Scholar at the Oxford Institute for Nursing, Midwifery and Allied Health Research (OxINMAHR) in 2016-2017.