RAND Health Care Featured Projects

Can the 24/7 Sobriety Program Reduce Problem Drinking and Improve Public Health?
The 24/7 Sobriety Program requires those arrested for or convicted of alcohol-related offenses to take twice-a-day breathalyzer tests or wear a continuous alcohol monitoring bracelet. Those who fail or skip their tests are immediately subject to swift, certain but modest sanctions—typically a day or two in jail.
40 Years of the RAND Health Insurance Experiment
2016 marked the 40th anniversary of the RAND Health Insurance Experiment (HIE), the largest health policy study in U.S. history.
ACOVE: Health Indicators Address Quality of Care in Older Adults
Vulnerable elders receive on average only half of recommended care; for conditions that affect primarily the elderly, they receive appropriate care less than one-third of the time. Interventions based on ACOVE indicators can improve the care physicians provide to older adults.
Advancing Clinical Decision Support
Advancing Clinical Decision Support is an intensive, multi-part project seeking address the major barriers that must be dealt with in order to enhance decisionmaking in clinical workflow. A particular focus of this project deals with meaningful use of electronic health record systems.
Analyses Related to Medicare Advantage and Part D Contract Star Ratings
RAND researchers are conducting analyses to further enhance the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) Star Ratings system and assisting with the annual calculation of Medicare Advantage (MA) and Part D Contract Star Ratings.
BRIGHT: Building Recovery by Improving Goals, Habits, and Thoughts
The Building Recovery by Improving Goals, Habits, and Thoughts (BRIGHT) project is a collaborative effort to understand how well cognitive behavioral therapy depression treatment works for people with substance use disorder.
Building Data Capacity to Study Economic Outcomes for Patient Centered Outcomes Research
To advance this important aspect of PCOR data capacity, the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation (ASPE), with support from the RAND Corporation, is planning a scientific symposium and accompanying special issue in the journal Medical Care, focused on understanding and advancing the ways in which patient-centered economic data can be collected, linked, and analyzed for PCOR studies.
CAHPS®
The Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems (CAHPS®) Study is an innovative effort to develop tools for surveying people about their health care experiences and reporting results to help consumers make better health-related decisions.
CalMHSA: Evaluation of California's Statewide Mental Health Prevention and Early Intervention Initiatives
The RAND Corporation is evaluating California's statewide prevention and early intervention programs, which aim to reduce negative outcomes for people experiencing mental illness.
CBITS Offers Online Training and Support to Improve Mental Health of Children and Families
The Cognitive Behavioral Intervention for Trauma in Schools (CBITS) program is a school-based, group, and individual intervention. CBITS is designed to reduce symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder, depression, and behavioral problems, and to improve grades and attendance, peer and parent support, and coping skills.
Choosing Chiropractic Care for Chronic Pain
The Choosing Chiropractic for Chronic Pain project examined the impact of evidence, outcomes, costs, and patient preferences on the choice of treatment for chronic low-back pain and chronic neck pain.
Collaboration Leading to Addiction Treatment and Recovery from Other Stresses (CLARO) Project
The CLARO project studies collaborative care as a treatment approach for people with co-occurring mental health and substance use disorders.
Comprehensive Assessment of Reform Efforts (COMPARE)
Policymakers are facing new challenges as they implement the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA). RAND COMPARE is a modeling tool that simulates the impact of implementation decisions on insurance coverage, premiums, and health care spending.
RAND Dementia Blueprint
Annual costs of dementia exceed those of cancer and heart disease and will only continue to rise as the nation's population ages. RAND researchers have identified key policy options to help strengthen and improve long-term services and supports for those with dementia and their caregivers.
Field Test Help Desk: IMPACT Act of 2014
As part of a project under the IMPACT Act of 2014 to create standardized patient assessment items for evaluating care, the Field Test Help Desk supports nurses taking part in field tests.
Evolution of an Epidemic: 20 Years of HIV Research at RAND
RAND has been in the vanguard of HIV research since the disease emerged on the national scene in the mid 1980s. Since then, as policy and clinical issues have evolved, RAND has adapted its focus and methods to address new issues.
Getting To Outcomes® (GTO) Toolkit
The Getting To Outcomes®: Improving Community-Based Substance-Use Prevention project assesses the effectiveness of participatory methods meant to assist community coalitions in preventing substance abuse and to improve community health.
Health Care Price Transparency in the United States
Lack of transparency around health care prices limits the ability of employers and other purchasers of health care to achieve quality and value. Through a three-round research study, RAND Health Care aims to demystify health care pricing.
The RAND Health Reform Opinion Study
The RAND Health Reform Opinion Study tracks public opinion of the Affordable Care Act by surveying the same people over time. This allows us to observe true changes in public opinion, rather than changes based on who was surveyed randomly.
Mapping Hospital Prices in Indiana
Price transparency nationwide could help employers become better-informed purchasers of health care and stronger advocates for their employees. Researchers compiled hospital costs across the state of Indiana and mapped the results for easy comparison.
Navigating Mental Health Care for Veterans
Findings and resources from RAND's vast body of research provide insights on how to help more veterans receive the mental health care they need.
Optimizing the Role of Military Behavioral Health Technicians
In the Military Health System, behavioral health technicians (BHTs) play an important role supporting licensed mental health providers in evaluating and treating patients and their families. To determine how to optimize the integration of behavioral health technicians' capabilities, the RAND Corporation conducted a survey of BHTs in the Military Health System.
Oregon's Options for Financing Health Care
Though an early adopter of the ACA, Oregon has more progress to make toward providing access to affordable health care. Partnering with RAND, the state evaluated three new health care financing options.
PADSIM: The Health Care Payment and Delivery Simulation Model
RAND's PADSIM tool helps policymakers estimate how providers would adjust their services in response to changes in how—and how much—they are paid.
Partners in Care: Treating Depression More Effectively
Most patients with symptoms of depression are not treated effectively in primary care settings. Partners in Care offers two quality improvement programs for treatment in primary care practices—one focusing on medication, the other on psychotherapy.
Create Your Own Hospital Ratings
The Personalized Hospital Performance Report Card lets you review, customize, and compare hospitals across the United States. Create your own custom ratings based on the hospital performance areas that are most important to you.
The PROMIS® Smoking Initiative
The PROMIS Smoking Initiative develops item banks to gauge how cigarette smokers understand their habit and its impact on their lives.
RAND Contributions to Veterans Choice Act Study
As a subcontractor to MITRE, RAND Corporation conducted three of the twelve assessments of the VA health care delivery system required by the Veterans Access Choice and Accountability Act (VACAA).
RAND/PPMD Patient-Centeredness Method (RPM)
The RAND/PPMD Patient-Centeredness Method, or RPM, helps patients, caregivers, and patient advocates systematically share their perspectives on the patient-centeredness of clinical guideline recommendations.
Reaching Veterans Online for Research and Outreach Efforts
The Reaching Veterans Online for Research and Outreach Efforts project recruited young adult veterans via Facebook for a brief, single-session, Internet-delivered intervention to reduce problem drinking.
Small Ideas for Saving Big Health Care Dollars Interactive Calculator
A review of RAND research identified small ideas that could save the U.S. health care system a total of up to $26 billion a year. Use this interactive calculator to combine different small ideas and view projected savings.