David Meltzer, Ph.D.

David O. Meltzer is an associate professor in the Department of Medicine and an associated faculty member in the Harris School and the Department of Economics. Meltzer's research explores problems in health economics and public policy with a focus on the theoretical foundations of medical cost-effectiveness analysis and the determinants of the cost and quality of care, especially in teaching hospitals. Meltzer is currently completing a randomized trial comparing the use of doctors who specialize in inpatient care ("hospitalists") with traditional physicians in six academic medical centers.

Meltzer received his MD and PhD in economics from the University of Chicago and completed his residency in internal medicine at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston. He is chief of the section of Hospital Medicine and director of the Center for Health and the Social Sciences at the University of Chicago and also co-director of the Program on Outcomes Research Training and the M.D./Ph.D. program in the social sciences. He serves on the faculty of the Graduate Program in Health Administration and Policy, the Population Research Center, and the Center on Aging. Meltzer is the recipient of numerous awards, including the National Institute of Health Medical Scientist Training Program Fellowship, the National Science Foundation Graduate Fellowship in Economics, the University of Chicago Searle Fellowship, the Lee Lusted Prize of the Society for Medical Decision Making, the Health Care Research Award of the National Institute for Health Care Management, the Eugene Garfield Award from Research America, and the Robert Wood Johnson Generalist Physician Award. Meltzer is a research associate of the National Bureau of Economic Research, elected member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation, and past president of the Society for Medical Decision Making. He has served on panels examining the future of Medicare for the National Academy of Social Insurance and the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) and U.S. organ allocation policy for the Institute of Medicine (IOM). He recently served on an IOM panel examining the effectiveness of the U.S. drug safety system and currently serves on The DHHS Secretary's Advisory Committee on Healthy People 2020, which aims to establish health objectives for the U.S. population.