David Asch, M.D., M.B.A.

Executive Director
Leonard Davis Institute of Health Economics
The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania

David Asch, M.D., M.B.A. is executive director of the Leonard Davis Institute of Health Economics at the University of Pennsylvania, where he is the Robert D. Eilers Professor of Medicine and Health Care Management and Economics at the School of Medicine and the Wharton School. Established in 1967, the Leonard Davis Institute is one of the oldest and best-regarded centers in the nation devoted to understanding and improving the organization, delivery, management, and financing of health care. More than 100 Senior Fellows conduct the work of the institute.

Asch received his bachelor's degree from Harvard University, his M.D. from Cornell University and his M.B.A. in health care administration and decision sciences from the Wharton School. He has been a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Clinical Scholar, a Measey Foundation Scholar, a John A. Hartford Foundation Faculty Fellow, and the recipient of two Health Services Research Career Development Awards from the Department of Veterans Affairs.

Asch is a leader in understanding how physicians and patients behave and make medical choices in clinical, financial, and ethically charged settings. He has special expertise in understanding how physicians and patients incorporate perceptions of financial cost and health risk into their decisions, including the adoption of new pharmaceuticals or medical technologies or the purchase of health or life insurance. His research combines elements of economic analysis with moral and psychological theory and marketing. He is the author of more than 100 published papers, chapters, and reports; he is frequently invited to lecture nationally and internationally; and he has attracted more than $15 million in federal grants.

In addition, Asch has been associate editor of the Journal of General Internal Medicine, a Trustee of the Society for Medical Decision Making, and has served on numerous federal research study sections. He consults frequently in health care issues in academics, government, and industry.

He teaches health policy at the Wharton School, and he practices internal medicine at the Philadelphia Veterans Affairs Medical Center, where he is chief of Health Services Research and co-director of the Center for Health Equity Research and Promotion.

Asch is the recipient of the Young Investigator Award from the Association for Health Services Research (1997), the Outstanding Paper of the Year Award from the Society for Medical Decision Making (1997), the Nellie Westerman Prize from the American Federation for Medical Research (1998), the Outstanding Investigator Award in Clinical Science from the American Federation for Medical Research (1999), and the Robert C. Witt Research Award for the best paper published by the American Risk and Insurance Association (2000).