Lecture up to 1 hour

Practice Management & Human Relations, AGD Subject Code 550

Why is healthcare so challenging and costly? Why do individuals often struggle to adhere to health behaviors that are clearly in their best interest? In this provocative keynote, Dr David A. Asch, MD, MBA—Senior Vice President for Strategic Initiatives at the University of Pennsylvania and the John Morgan Professor at the Perelman School and the Wharton School—invites you to explore these pressing questions.

Drawing on his extensive expertise, Dr Asch will examine the stark contrasts between the simplicity of online retail and the complexities of healthcare. With online shopping giants like Amazon revolutionizing consumer experiences, can their success offer valuable insights for transforming dental and health care? As other industries leverage automation to boost efficiency and enhance customer service, healthcare remains largely unchanged.

This lecture will reveal how healthcare can benefit from adopting innovative strategies borrowed from retail and automation. Discover how understanding human behavior and integrating emotional engagement can drive significant improvements in patient-clinician interactions. Join Dr. Asch as he uncovers the potential for a fundamental transformation in healthcare, inspired by lessons from seemingly unrelated industries.

Upon completion of this session, the attendees should be able to:

• Distinguish traditional economics from behavioral economics.
• Balance the adoption of automation with the preservation of emotional engagement.

David A. Asch, MD, MBA is the Sr Vice President for Strategic Initiatives at the University of Pennsylvania and the John Morgan Professor at the Perelman School and the Wharton School. He created and from 2001 to 2012 directed the Center for Health Equity Research and Promotion — the Department of Veterans Affairs national center to understand and eliminate racial disparities in health and health care. From 1998 to 2012 he was Executive Director of the Leonard Davis Institute of Health Economics. From 2012 to 2022 he was Executive Director of the Penn Medicine Center for Health Care Innovation. His research is in the area of behavioral economics and aims to improve how physicians and patients make medical choices. He is the author of more than 500 scientific papers and is an elected member of the National Academy of Medicine.