Meet our behavioral economics experts
KAREN SUSSMAN HORGAN
CO-FOUNDER & CEO
Karen co-founded VAL Health to apply behavioral economics to improve health and health care. A proven expert in developing high impact behavior change and engagement programs, Karen is commonly found presenting at leading industry conference and private speaking events including SXSW, HIMSS, the AHIP Institute, and the World Economic Forum. As the CEO, she has spearheaded the development of hundreds of behavior change programs that enable clients to overcome healthcare’s biggest challenges.
Prior to starting VAL Health, Karen was Chief Marketing Officer at Keystone Strategy, a consulting firm affiliated with experts from Harvard, University of Pennsylvania and MIT, where she led global client engagements to develop R&D and innovation solutions for Fortune 500 companies. Karen also previously led marketing and product management teams for early-stage technology companies and was a consultant with Bain and Company in Boston and Hong Kong.
Karen holds an MBA from the Harvard Business School, a BA from the University of Pennsylvania, and a BS from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.
KEVIN VOLPP
CO-FOUNDER & PRINCIPAL
Dr. Kevin Volpp is the leading authority on behavioral economics and health. His work has developed innovative insights and tested ways to apply insights from behavioral economics to improve health outcomes through patients and providers. Kevin is the Founders President’s Distinguished Professor of Medicine and Medical Ethics and Policy at the Perelman School of Medicine and Professor of Health Care Management at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. He is also the founding Director of the Leonard Davis Institute Center for Health Incentives and Behavioral Economics.
Kevin has published more than 250 peer-reviewed articles and commentaries, including in The New England Journal of Medicine, the Journal of the American Medical Association, and Health Affairs. His research and ideas have been widely covered by media outlets such as The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Economist, Good Morning America, the BBC, and National Public Radio (NPR). Kevin has received numerous awards including career achievement awards from the National Institutes of Health for his work on social and behavioral sciences and election into the National Academy of Medicine.
Kevin holds a PhD from The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, an MD from the University of Pennsylvania, and an AB from Harvard University.
DAVID ASCH
CO-FOUNDER AND PRINCIPAL
Dr. David Asch, a leading behavioral economist, advances individual and population health by improving how physicians and patients make decisions in health care and everyday life, including the use of medical treatments and personal health behaviors. David is Executive Director of the Penn Medicine Center for Health Care Innovation. He is the John Morgan Professor of Medicine and Medical Ethics and Health Policy at the Perelman School of Medicine, and Professor of Health Care Management and Operations, Information and Decisions at the Wharton School, at the University of Pennsylvania; from 1998 to 2012 David served as Executive Director of the Leonard Davis Institute of Health Economics.
David is the author of more than 350 published papers and has received many awards. In 2018, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation presented him with the David E. Rogers Award, which recognized his “major contributions to improving the health and health care of the American people.”
David holds an MBA from The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, an MD from Cornell University, and an AB from Harvard University.
EMILY BOYM
PRINCIPAL
At VAL Health Emily leads Client Service, overseeing all delivery, managing client-facing teams, and ensuring the distinctive quality of our behavioral economics solutions. Passionate about health care and health policy, Emily is an accomplished strategy consultant with experience leading projects across diverse health industry stakeholders. From project kickoff through completion, she works with clients to identify their true challenges and develop actionable solutions grounded in proven science. Emily regularly manages teams to develop solutions to drive initial and ongoing engagement, design custom incentives strategies, and improve specific and broad quality measures. Prior to joining VAL Health, she was a Manager with PwC's Strategy& consulting group, focused on health care payers and industry new entrants and innovators.
Emily holds an MPH from Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health and a BS from Emory University.
JAMES PATTON
CO-FOUNDER & CHAIRMAN
Dr. Jim Patton is a board-certified internist and successful health care business investor, owner, and manager. In addition to co-founding VAL Health, he is a founder of Millennium Oncology Management, a consulting and physician management company and founder and board member of Advaxis, a publicly-traded immuno-oncology company. As a venture capitalist, Jim invested in health informatics, biotechnology, and service providers. Previously, Jim was Medical Director and Vice-President of HealthExpress, a start-up focused on individual and employer health and wellness programs, and was an officer of Universal Health Services, a publicly-traded hospital management company. Jim served two years on active duty in the United States Navy as a general medical officer.
Jim holds an MD from the Medical College of Pennsylvania, an MBA from The Wharton School and a BS from the University of Michigan.
Raina Merchant, MD, MSHP
Advisor
Dr. Raina Merchant is an associate vice president at Penn Medicine and an associate professor of emergency medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. She has secondary appointments in the Department of Internal Medicine and the Department of Anesthesia and Critical Care. She serves as the director of the Penn Medicine Center for Digital Health and co-director of the Penn National Clinician Scholars Program.
Her work focuses on the intersection of digital media and health and often bridges new technologies in the field of cardiovascular health and resuscitation science. She has conducted projects evaluating health behaviors and communication on digital platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Yelp, Instagram, and Google.
Raina has over 140 peer-reviewed publications in journals such as NEJM, JAMA, Circulation, and Health Affairs. Her work has been featured in Wired, the Economist, the Wall Street Journal, and others. She is a member of the editorial board of JAMA, an Aspen Health Innovators Fellow and member of the National Academy of Medicine
Raina has an MD from the University of Chicago, an MSHP from the University of Pennsylvania, and a BA from Yale University.
GEORGE LOEWENSTEIN, PHD
Advisor
Dr. George Loewenstein is a pioneer and founder of the fields of behavioral economics and neuroeconomics, and currently teaches at Carnegie Mellon University as the Herbert A. Simon Professor of Economics and Psychology. A respected thought leader with more than 200 publications in peer-reviewed journals, George examines the interface between economics and psychology through his research. He is the former president of the Society for Judgment and Decision Making, a member of the Russell Sage Foundation Behavioral Economics Roundtable, recipient of the Best Paper Award from the Society for Business Ethics, and served on the board of the Society for Neuroeconomics. With a book on Behavioral Economics and Human Motivation, (Oxford University Press), he is a specialist on the motivational effects of economic and non-economic incentives.
George has done extensive research on the topic of intertemporal choice (choices between immediate and delayed costs and benefits), on the regulation of visceral urges, such as hunger, pain and drug craving, and on decision making under risk. In recent years, he is one of a small group of behavioral economists who have been attempting to use the tools of their field not only to identify limitations in human decision making, but to improve it. Specifically, he has worked on a number of studies testing the effectiveness of patient incentives in a range of clinical areas including obesity, medication adherence, and mental acuity for older adults.
George holds a PhD in Economics from Yale University and BA from Brandeis University.
PATRICK CONWAY, MD
Advisor
Dr. Patrick Conway is credited for being one of the driving forces behind the national movement to value-based care, with health care payments tied to quality and innovation. He is currently a Senior Executive in Residence at Optum and the former Deputy Administrator for Innovation and Quality and the Director of the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation (CMMI) at the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS). A Robert Wood Jonson Clinical Scholar, Patrick was elected to the National Academy of Medicine in 2014. Patrick served as a White House Fellow and has received the Presidential Rank Award, Distinguished Executive Award, as well as the Health and Human Services Secretary’s Award for Distinguished Service.
Patrick holds an MD from the Baylor School of Medicine, an MSc from The University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, and a BS from Texas A&M University.
MATTHEW PRESS, MD, MSc
Advisor
Dr. Matthew Press, MD, MSc is Associate Professor of Medicine at the Perelman School of Medicine, Lecturer at the School of Nursing, and Lecturer at the Wharton School, all of the University of Pennsylvania. He is an expert in healthcare payment, population health, and clinical operations. His experience spans academia, government, and health system leadership. He previously led Penn Medicine’s Primary Care Service Line, Penn Medicine’s community primary care network, and the Department of Family Medicine and Community Health. In those roles, he built population health management and value-based payment programs, drove strategy and clinical operations, and increased network size, quality, and efficiency.
From 2014-2017, Dr. Press was a member of the senior leadership team at the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation at CMS, where he helped develop new payment and care delivery models including ACOs, bundled payments, integrated mental health, and medical homes. He has served as government lead of the Health Care Payment Learning and Action Network (HCPLAN) and as a member of the AMA RVS Update Committee (RUC).
Dr. Press is a practicing outpatient general internist and is engaged in research in the areas of population health, integrated mental health, and payment reform. His work has been published in the New England Journal of Medicine, JAMA, and Health Affairs and has been covered by the New York Times and the Associated Press. He received his MD from Brown University and completed his internal medicine residency and the RWJF Clinical Scholars Program at the University of Pennsylvania.