Kai Yeung, PharmD, PhD, is a pharmacist and pharmaceutical economist with expertise in patient medication-use behaviors, insurance design, and outcomes research. His objective is to develop and evaluate incentives to encourage high-value use of health care services. Dr. Yeung has conducted research evaluating policies focused on specialty drug access, value-based insurance design, the consequences of insurance switching, and financial incentives. He combines applied econometric and cost-effectiveness analysis tools with a clinical understanding of prescription drugs and health insurance design to gain new insights in these areas.
Dr. Yeung has a line of research on designing and evaluating policies that align patient prescription drug out-of-pocket costs with estimated value using cost-effectiveness analysis. He has used econometric methods to quantify the impact of a value-based formulary on patient medication-utilization behavior, health outcomes and health care expenditures from patient and health care payer perspectives. For this work, Dr. Yeung successfully competed for two research grants: a multidisciplinary research training grant from the National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and a health services research dissertation grant from the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ). Different parts of this project were recognized by the International Society for Pharmacoeconomics and Outcomes Research 2014 and 2015 annual meetings as the best student podium presentation award, and the Vancouver Health Economics Methodology 2016 meeting as the best student paper award. Dr. Yeung continues to innovate in the generation and evaluation of this type of benefit design.
Dr. Yeung received his PhD in pharmaceutical economics from the Comparative Health Outcomes, Policy, and Economics (CHOICE) Institute at the University of Washington and his PharmD from the University of Southern California. During his PharmD training, Dr. Yeung cultivated a broad perspective on the expanded use of evidence and analytics in decision-making, giving him experience in working with a diverse group of health care stakeholders, including:
Pharmacy benefit design, applied econometrics, healthcare costs, value-based insurance design, cost-effectiveness analysis, behavioral economics, alternative payment models, health policy evaluation
Pharmacoepidemiology of opioid use, identification of early onset Alzheimer’s disease
Design and evaluation of incentives for medication adherence
Patient and physician shared savings models to incentivize healthy behavior
Prevention and treatment
Yeung K, Dorsey CN, Mettert K. Effect of new Medicare enrollment on health, healthcare utilization, and cost: a scoping review. J Am Geriatr Soc. 2021 Mar 15. doi: 10.1111/jgs.17113. [Epub ahead of print]. PubMed
Li M, Yeung K. Managing high-priced biologic agents: challenges and potential solutions. J Manag Care Spec Pharm. 2021;27(3):411-414. doi: 10.18553/jmcp.2021.27.3.411. PubMed
McCurry SM, Zhu W, Von Korff M, Wellman R, Morin CM, Thakral M, Yeung K, Vitiello MV. Effect of telephone cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia in older adults with osteoarthritis pain: a randomized clinical trial. JAMA Intern Med. 2021 Feb 22:e209049. doi: 10.1001/jamainternmed.2020.9049. [Epub ahead of print]. PubMed
Yeung K, Richards J, Goemer E, Lozano P, Lapham G, Williams E, Glass J, Lee A, Achtmeyer C, Caldeiro R, Parrish R, Bradley K. Costs of using evidence-based implementation strategies for behavioral health integration in a large primary care system. Health Serv Res. 2020 Dec;55(6):913-923. doi: 10.1111/1475-6773.13592. PubMed
Yeung K, Barthold D, Dusetzina SB, Basu A. Patient and plan spending after state specialty-drug out-of-pocket spending caps. N Engl J Med. 2020 Aug 6;383(6):558-566. doi: 10.1056/NEJMsa1910366. PubMed
A study among KP members with sleep problems and osteoarthritis shows promise for overcoming obstacles to treatment.
Now more than ever we can benefit from studies embedded in health-care systems to answer common clinical questions.
Kaiser Permanente Washington shows price may not be a barrier to primary care implementation, Dr. Kai Yeung reports.
Managed Healthcare Executive, Aug 5, 2020