Bio: Peter Broadhead, a 2002-03 Commonwealth Fund Harkness Fellow in Health Care Policy and Practice, is an assistant secretary in the Commonwealth Department of Health and Ageing in Australia. Most recently, he has been responsible within the Office of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health for the major funding programs for health services for Australia's indigenous people. Prior to that he was responsible for the Australian national case mix development program, including the continued development of Australian Refined Diagnosis Related Groups and the National Hospital Costs Data Collection; the establishment and evaluation of trials of coordinated care to explore new approaches to funding, organizing, and delivering care for people with complex needs; and the National Hospital Demonstration Program, which funded innovation in hospital services delivery. He has also chaired two working groups of the Australian Health Ministers' Advisory Council, one implementing a program to provide advice to health ministers on improving the care of the elderly and another on improving the coordination of Commonwealth, state, and territory policy and programs for primary health and community care. Broadhead has also worked in two different state health departments, undertaking analyses of social inequalities in health, regional health services planning, development and implementation of population-based resource reallocation, and the early development and use of diagnosis related groups in Australia, among other responsibilities.
Placement: University of California
Mentors: Harold Luft, Ph.D.
Project: Market Competition in Health Care
Description: Broadhead's project aimed to develop an understanding of how market competition in health insurance and health care operates in the U.S., with a particular focus on California, and the strengths and weaknesses of competition in containing costs and supporting quality and efficiency. His methods included a literature review, analysis of primary documents (e.g., contracts), and interviews with researchers, policy analysts, and key people in health plans and provider organizations.