Research Grants

1. Funding source: NIHR Public Health Research (NIHR169449). Community Wealth Building Evaluation: Learning Lessons from Scotland - a mixed method evaluation of the impact of community wealth building on economic and health outcomes and health inequalities (CoWBELLs) (2025-2028)
2. Funding source: NIHR Research Support Service Research Methods Fund Award. How can we use routinely collected data to evaluate public mental health interventions? (2025-2026)

Current Teaching

2023, 2024, 2025: DHR409 Applied Health Economics (Module Lead)

2023, 2024: DHR529 Data Analysis (Module Lead)

2023, 2024, 2025: DHR403 Principles of Research Design and Practical Research Ethnics (Supervisor)

2023, 2024, 2025: DHR499 Dissertation (Supervisor)

Qualifications

PhD Health Economics, MSc Economics, BA(Hons) Economics and Politics

Career Details

I studied an BA (Hons) in Economics and Politics (2005-2008) and an MSc in Economics from the University of Manchester in (2009-2010). I then joined the Manchester Centre for Health Economics as a Research Associate and was promoted to Research Fellow. I worked on various projects including:

• the development of methods for health care workforce planning
• development of age-period-cohort models to analyse population ageing
• evaluations of pay-for-performance schemes in health care
• policy evaluations for government on the economics of addiction
• the development of resource allocation formulae in health care
• the impact of health system change on health inequalities
• health system reforms including the 2012 Health and Social Care act,
• evaluations of the NHS Diabetes Prevention Programme
• the measurement of sexual orientiation in surveys
• the relationship between informal and formal care
• assessment of community-based optometry services
• assessment of geographical differences in the epidemiology diabetes
• evaluation of domestic violence interventions
• quality improvement schemes of patient safety in Tracheostomy care

My teaching activity at Manchester included teaching on the final year Econometrics module to BSc Economics students, and the Health Economics module to MSc Economics students. My PhD supervision included research into the economics of psoriasis.

I have worked as a Senior Research Analyst in private sector health economics consultancies producing research for government agencies, third sector and pharmaceutical clients.

I joined Lancaster University as a Senior Lecturer in Health Economics in September 2022.

My current research includes:

• analyses of the impacts of the NHS Diabetes Prevention Programme on health inequalities
• evaluation of the NROL Stroke Rehabilitation pathway

• analysis of how English local authorities allocated the public health grant across spending programmes

• evaluation of the impacts of Community Wealth Building on population health and economic outcomes
• the use of quasi-experimental methods in public health research
• research into the health economics of mental health conditions

Thesis Title

Substance misuse related hospital admissions, costs and treatment outcomes: econometric analysis of administrative data for England

Thesis Outline

Substance misuse represents a global public health concern. The harms caused by substance use remain considerable internationally: 0.6 percent of the global adult population were estimated to have a substance use disorder in 2015, with 28 million disability-adjusted life years lost as a result of substance misuse and 17 million health years of life lost as a result of substance use disorders. However, there is relatively limited evidence on the economic impact of substance misuse on health care for England.

An important pillar of recent substance misuse policy focusing on abstinence was a pay-for-performance (P4P) scheme which linked the income of providers of addiction treatment services to treatment outcomes. There is limited evidence on the effects of this scheme on in-treatment outcomes and wider related health care use and costs.

This thesis applies econometric methods to two large administrative datasets for England between 2009-10 and 2015-16 in four main chapters.

The first explores how the costs of substance misuse related hospital admissions have changed over the period 2009-10 to 2015-16 using Hospital Episode Statistics (HES), and how different costing approaches yield different estimates. Costs are shown to be overestimated by top-down approaches that apply average costs to specific diseases, and that estimates are highly sensitive to the use of primary and/or secondary diagnosis codes of substance misuse.

The second uses an event study design to examine how hospital activity and related costs change around the time of the first occurrence. Annual costs per person are on average £2,953.65 higher in the event year than six years before, and remain £687.02 higher five years after.

The third uses a difference-in-differences design to evaluate the impact of the introduction of P4P for providers of addiction treatment services on treatment outcomes using data from the National Drug Treatment Monitoring System (NDTMS) for 2010-11 to 2012-13. P4P reduced the probability of individuals completing substance misuse treatment successfully by 1.3 percentage points and increased the probability of individuals declining to continue with treatment by 0.9 percentage points.

The final chapter considers the schemes impact on hospital admissions and costs, finding that individuals hospital admissions were 1.507 times higher in P4P areas after its introduction compared with non-intervention areas. The number and cost of substance misuse related hospital admissions increased substantially between 2009-10 and 2015-16. Furthermore, individuals hospital activity and costs increases prior to an admission diagnosed as being related to substance misuse - and is/are persistently higher after the event. Introduction of P4P for providers of addiction treatment services had negative effects on outcomes in the addiction treatment population and led to increased hospital admissions in P4P areas for a wider population with a record of substance misuse.

Link: https://pure.manchester.ac.uk/ws/portalfiles/portal/182556649/FULL_TEXT.PDF

To cite this: Substance misuse related hospital admissions, costs and treatment outcomes: econometric analysis of administrative data for England

Mason, T. (Author). 31 Dec 2019

Student thesis: Phd

PhD Supervisions Completed

Quantifying the Economic Impact of Psoriasis (Peslie Ng'ambi) Link: https://research.manchester.ac.uk/en/studentTheses/quantifying-the-economic-impact-of-psoriasis

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