Professor Hilal Atasoy is finalist for NIHCM Foundation’s annual research award

The National Institute for Health Care Management (NIHCM) Foundation selected “The Role of Decision Support Systems in Attenuating Racial Biases in Healthcare Delivery” co-authored by Kartik K. Ganju, Hilal Atasoy, Jeffery McCullough, and Brad Greenwood as one of five finalists for NIHCM Foundation’s 27th Annual Research Award from a competitive pool of nearly 100 entries.

From the abstract: “Although significant research has examined how technology can intensify racial and other outgroup biases, limited work has investigated the role information systems can play in abating them. Racial biases are particularly worrisome in healthcare, where underrepresented minorities suffer disparities in access to care, quality of care, and clinical outcomes. In this paper, we examine the role clinical decision support systems play in attenuating systematic biases among black patients, relative to white patients, in rates of amputation and revascularization stemming from diabetes mellitus. . . . [Our] findings highlight the role information systems and digitized patient care can play in promoting unbiased decision making by structuring and standardizing care procedures.”

Dr. Hilal Atasoy said, “I am delighted that my paper was selected as a finalist in the prestigious Research Award of the National Institute for Healthcare Management. I hope that this work contributes to the broader discussion on the role of information technology in racial bias and discrimination.”

Atasoy is an Assistant Professor of Accounting and Information Systems at Rutgers Business School. Currently, Dr. Atasoy teaches cost accounting, an upper-division course for the accounting major.  She joined the faculty at Rutgers from the Fox School of Business at Temple University, where she was an assistant professor. She has a Ph.D. and a Master’s degree in Economics from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. Her research analyzes how information systems and the associated flow of information across providers affect healthcare and the impacts of information technology and innovation on labor markets. Dr. Atasoy’s research has been published in leading outlets such as Management Science, Information Systems Research, Production and Operations Management, and Industrial and Labor Relations Review.

Professor Atasoy’s paper “The Role of Decision Support Systems in Attenuating Racial Biases in Healthcare Delivery” was published in Management Science, a scholarly journal that publishes scientific research on the practice of management.

The National Institute for Health Care Management (NIHCM) Foundation is a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization dedicated to transforming health care through evidence and collaboration (www.nihcm.org).

Press Release

The Management Science community congratulates Kartik K. Ganju, Hilal Atasoy, Jeffery McCullough, and Brad Greenwood whose recent Management Science paper "The Role of Decision Support Systems in Attenuating Racial Biases in Healthcare Delivery" was chosen as a finalist in the prestigious Research Award of the National Institute for Healthcare Management. Other finalists include papers published in the Journal of Political Economy, The New England Journal of Medicine, the Review of Economic Studies and the American Journal of Health Economics. The Research Award recognizes outstanding published work from researchers furthering innovation in health care financing, delivery and organization or the implementation of health care policy. For more information, see Research Award Finalists (nihcm.org)

Abstract

Although significant research has examined how technology can intensify racial and other outgroup biases, limited work has investigated the role information systems can play in abating them. Racial biases are particularly worrisome in healthcare, where underrepresented minorities suffer disparities in access to care, quality of care, and clinical outcomes. In this paper, we examine the role clinical decision support systems play in attenuating systematic biases among black patients, relative to white patients, in rates of amputation and revascularization stemming from diabetes mellitus. Using a panel of inpatient data from three states, and a difference in difference approach, results suggest that the adoption of the clinical decision support systems significantly shrinks disparities in the amputation rate across white and black patients; with no evidence that the increased revascularization is simply delaying eventual amputations. Further, evidence indicates that this effect is driven by changes in treatment care protocols, rather than altering within physician decision-making. These findings highlight the role information systems and digitized patient care can play in promoting unbiased decision-making by structuring and standardizing care procedures.

Reference:

Ganju K. K., H. Atasoy, J. McCullough and B. Greenwood (2020). "The Role of Decision Support Systems in Attenuating Racial Biases in Healthcare Delivery." Management Science, Vol. 66, No. 11, November 2020, pp. 5171–5181.

Available at SSRN: https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3465839