Events
3600 Civic Center Blvd, 11-102AB (Hybrid)
Bronstein/Research Ethics & Policy Series (REPS): "Open Science and Race Science: Values in Conflict" - Eric Turkheimer, PhD
Learn More
2026-10-06 12:00:00
2026-10-06 13:00:00
America/New_York
Bronstein/Research Ethics & Policy Series (REPS): "Open Science and Race Science: Values in Conflict" - Eric Turkheimer, PhD
Eric Turkheimer, PhD
Hugh Scott Hamilton Professor of Psychology
University of Virginia
Dating at least from Darwin and his half-cousin Francis Galton, one of the first impulses at the dawn of evolutionary and genetic discoveries has been to apply them in the service of racism. The history of attempts to justify racism with scientific biology now stretches over a century and a half. In the modern era, racially motivated science presents difficult problems for the responsible scientific community. Neither of the more extreme responses-- striving to forbid it or pretending it is simply normal science-- is satisfactory. Moreover, contemporary changes to the landscape of scientific publication have made it increasingly difficult to find a line between unregulated internet discussion and peer-reviewed reporting in sanctioned journals. Dr. Turkheimer will review the broad history of these problems, trace them through his own career, and provide some suggestions moving forward.
Registration required; Lunch provided
Streaming available via Zoom.
3600 Civic Center Blvd, 11-102AB (Hybrid)
Penn Medical Ethics
CCB 08-031, 8th Floor, 3600 Civic Center Blvd. (Note: Virtual attendees can join by accessing this link: https://upenn.zoom.us/j/95740259034.)
Health Policy Research Seminar: Caitlin Caspi, SCD
Learn More
2026-10-08 10:00:00
2026-10-08 11:00:00
America/New_York
Health Policy Research Seminar: Caitlin Caspi, SCD
Topic: "Wages, SNAP, and the Safety Net: Findings from a 5-year Study of Nutrition-Related Outcomes Among Low-Wage Workers."
About the Talk: This presentation integrates findings from an NIH-funded natural experiment examining the nutrition-related effects of a phased minimum wage increase in an intervention and comparison city. The study followed low-wage workers over five years (2018–2022), combining difference-in-difference analysis with nested qualitative interviews. Wages increased similarly in both cities, providing no evidence of a differential wage effect attributable to the minimum wage policy. Consistent with this, there were no policy-specific effects on body mass index, food spending, or most nutrition-related and health outcomes. At the same time, food insecurity declined substantially while SNAP participation and benefit amounts increased, particularly during the COVID-19 period. Qualitative findings contextualize these trends, showing how participants experienced changes to SNAP and the broader safety net during the study period. These supports provided meaningful, but temporary, economic relief. The presentation will integrate quantitative and qualitative findings to examine the challenges of evaluating a single economic policy within a dynamic policy environment and consider how wages, nutrition assistance, housing, and other safety-net policies interact to shape economic stability and health.
About the Speaker: Caitlin Caspi, ScD, is Associate Professor in the Department of Allied Health Sciences and serves as the Director of Food Security Initiatives at the Rudd Center for Food Policy and Heath. Dr. Caspi is a social epidemiologist focusing on evaluating policies and interventions related to food insecurity, diet quality, and weight outcomes. Dr. Caspi uses a social-ecological lens and a community-engaged approach in her work. Her research incorporates food policies and other social determinants of health to address inequities related to nutrition. Her food insecurity research is largely focused on U.S. food assistance programs and the charitable food system. She has also led several qualitative and quantitative studies aimed at understanding how non-food policies, such as minimum wage and COVID-19 economic relief measures, affect food insecurity and other health outcomes among households with lower incomes. Her work has been funded by the National Institutes of Health, Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s Healthy Eating Research program, and HHS Administration for Community Living, among other funders. She completed her graduate work at the Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health. She joined the Department of Allied Health Sciences as Associate Professor in 2020, coming from the University of Minnesota’s Department of Family Medicine and Community Health.
CCB 08-031, 8th Floor, 3600 Civic Center Blvd. (Note: Virtual attendees can join by accessing this link: https://upenn.zoom.us/j/95740259034.)
Penn Medical Ethics
Steinberg-Dietrich Hall, Room 1201, 3620 Locust Walk, Philadelphia, PA
HP X LDI X CHIBE Research Seminar: John Cawley, PhD
Learn More
2026-10-13 12:00:00
2026-10-13 13:00:00
America/New_York
HP X LDI X CHIBE Research Seminar: John Cawley, PhD
Please note: Registration is required. In-person attendance is strongly encouraged, although virtual access will be provided for all registrants.
Co-sponsored with the Leanord Davis Institute of Health Economics.
John Cawley, PhD, is the Daniel Patrick Moynihan Chair in Public Policy and Professor of Economics and Public Administration and International Affairs at Syracuse University. He also serves as Senior Research Associate in the Maxwell-based Center for Policy Research and as a research affiliate in the Lerner Center for Public Health Promotion and Population Health. His research focuses on the economics of risky health behaviors; in particular, those that relate to obesity. He also serves as an Honorary Professor of Economics at the J.E. Cairnes School of Business and Economics at the University of Galway in Ireland. In 2016, he was named a Fulbright Specialist in Economics to Ireland through the Fulbright Scholar Program. Cawley is President-elect of the American Society of Health Economists and will serve as President from 2026-27. Since 2022 he has served on the board of directors of the International Health Economics Association. Cawley received a PhD in economics from the University of Chicago.
Steinberg-Dietrich Hall, Room 1201, 3620 Locust Walk, Philadelphia, PA
Penn Medical Ethics
3600 Civic Center Blvd., 8-031 (hybrid)
Penn Bioethics Seminar (PBS): "Trust, But Verify: How AI is Changing Radiology Practice" - Tessa Cook, MD, PhD
Learn More
2026-10-20 12:00:00
2026-10-20 13:00:00
America/New_York
Penn Bioethics Seminar (PBS): "Trust, But Verify: How AI is Changing Radiology Practice" - Tessa Cook, MD, PhD
But Verify: How AI is Changing Radiology Practice
Tessa Cook, MD, PhD
Associate Professor of Radiology
Vice Chair of Practice Transformation
Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania
AI in healthcare is spreading rapidly, and radiology as a specialty is no stranger to this technology. More than 75% of FDA-authorized software-as-a-medical-device tools in healthcare are for radiology, and 90% of radiologists in a recent ACR survey reported using some form of AI in their practice.
Aside from the myriad questions about how and whether to deploy AI in the clinic and how to maximize the return on investment in both financial and non-financial terms, several ethical questions arise. In this talk, we’ll consider two: 1) do patients have a right to know when AI is used in the course of their care, and 2) what are the ethical and medicolegal considerations at play when a radiologist’s expert judgment disagrees with an AI result?
3600 Civic Center Blvd., 8-031 (hybrid)
Penn Medical Ethics
CCB 08-031, 8th Floor, 3600 Civic Center Blvd. (Note: Virtual attendees can join by accessing this link: https://upenn.zoom.us/j/95740259034.)
Health Policy Research Seminar: Daniel Ollendorf, PhD, MPH
Learn More
2026-10-22 10:00:00
2026-10-22 17:30:00
America/New_York
Health Policy Research Seminar: Daniel Ollendorf, PhD, MPH
Topic: "At the Intersection of Access and Affordability: A Brief, Tortured History of Health Technology Assessment and the Current Role of ICER.”
Co-sponsored with the Leanord Davis Institute of Health Economics and the Center for Technology, Innovation & Competition
Dr. Ollendorf will describe the evolution of health technology assessment as a discipline, its interaction with US health policy, and the current role of the Institute for Clinical and Economic Review as a private-sector research organization trying to bring relevant conversations on access, pricing, and ethics back into the mainstream.
Dan Ollendorf is ICER’s Chief Scientific Officer and Director of Health Technology Assessment (HTA) Methods and Engagement, with responsibility for managing the organization’s internal health economics capacity and program of external collaboration, as well as collaboration with international HTA bodies and other stakeholders on key process and methods topics.
From 2007-2018, Dr. Ollendorf was Chief Scientific Officer for ICER, where he oversaw the broader HTA process and managed relationships with multiple stakeholders and research collaborators. From 2018-2023, Dr. Ollendorf served as the Director of Value Measurement & Global Health Initiatives at the Center for the Evaluation of Value and Risk in Health (CEVR) at Tufts Medical Center, where he focused on value assessment methods, drug pricing policy, and building international capacity for and interest in HTA. In addition to his current role at ICER, Dr. Ollendorf maintains a faculty appointment at CEVR and continues to teach in the Center’s graduate certificate program as well as participate in ongoing research.
Dr. Ollendorf is also a non-resident Fellow in Global Health at the Center for Global Development and serves on the Board of Directors for the ISPOR, the Professional Society for Health Economics and Outcomes Research. From 2019-2024, he served as Chair of the Health Technology Assessment International (HTAi) Global Policy Forum. Dr. Ollendorf received his PhD in Clinical Epidemiology from the University of Amsterdam, and an MPH in Health Policy & Management/Epidemiology from Boston University.
CCB 08-031, 8th Floor, 3600 Civic Center Blvd. (Note: Virtual attendees can join by accessing this link: https://upenn.zoom.us/j/95740259034.)
Penn Medical Ethics
To be added to MEHP's events listserv, please contact lisa.bailey@pennmedicine.upenn.edu.