Addictions Grand Challenge Policy Speaker Series

Thursday, August 30, 2018, 3-5pm

Dr. Jevay Grooms, "Substance Use Disorder Treatment in the Context of the U.S. Opioid Epidemic: Comparisons to the Crack Epidemic"

Assistant Professor of Economics, The Howard University

Social Science Research Commons Grand Hall (Woodburn Hall 200)

Dr. Jevay Grooms' research focuses broadly on health policies as they relate to underrepresented communities. Her current research studies domestic health policies and interventions geared toward individuals who suffer from substance use disorders and behavioral health conditions as well as Medicaid Expansion. This body of research includes opioid prescribing behavior of physicians, the effectiveness of prescription drug monitoring programs, the effect of a national opioid advisory, and access to treatment facilities for mental and behavioral health.

View materials on IUScholarWorks (event flyer, presentation slides)

Thursday, September 20, 2018, 11:15am-12:30 pm canceled

Dr. Rosalie Liccardo Pacula

Co-Director of the RAND Drug Policy Research Center, RAND Corporation

Social Science Research Commons Grand Hall (Woodburn Hall 200)

Rosalie Pacula, Ph.D., is the co-director of the RAND Drug Policy Research Center, a professor at the Pardee RAND Graduate School and holds many other appointments. Her research over the last 20 years has largely focused on issues related to illegal or imperfect markets (e.g. illicit drug markets), measurement of the size of these markets, the impact they have on behavior (suppliers and consumers), and the effectiveness of policy interventions at targeting market behaviors. In recent work she has studied medical marijuana policies, barriers to the diffusion of buprenorphine (an evidence-based pharmacotherapy for heroin addiction), impacts of formulary management and benefit design strategies on prescription opioid misuse, and microsimulation platforms used to evaluate the effectiveness of alternative alcohol prevention and treatment strategies.

Thursday, October 25, 2018, 3-5pm

Dr. Carol J. Boyd, “Adolescents’ Medical and Nonmedical Use of Controlled Medications”

School of Nursing, University of Michigan

Carol J. Boyd, PhD, MSN, RN, FAAN is the Deborah J Oakley Professor and the Director of the Center for the Study of Drugs, Alcohol, Smoking and Health in the School of Nursing and a Research Professor in the Addiction Center at the University of Michigan—Ann Arbor. Professor Boyd is an internationally recognized substance abuse scholar and the former director of the UM Substance Abuse Research Center (1995-2004) and the UM Institute for Research on Women & Gender (2005-2011).

 As a researcher, Professor Boyd has received extramural funding to study: women crack smokers (1989-1995, NIH funded), Michigan prisoners and their substance abuse treatment needs (1999 –2004, MDOC & Robert Wood Johnson funded), youth and college students’ alcohol, drug use and e-cigarette use (2003 to present, NIH funded) and LGB sub-populations and substance use disorders (2008 to present, NIH funded). In 1999, Professor Boyd was the first researcher to develop a web-based survey –  Student Life Survey -- to study drug and alcohol use among college students. The Student Life Survey became the foundation for the Secondary Student Life Survey (2003-currently). At least 5 NIH funded studies resulted from the Student Life Surveys. The “smart phone” version of the Secondary Student Life Survey is currently being piloted for substance use surveillance in Nevada.

Professor Boyd frequently advises advocacy groups on reducing the risks of controlled medications (her ABCs of Prescription Medication Safety Project), as well as advising risk management and post-marketing surveillance advisory boards. Professor Boyd publishes extensively in health and interdisciplinary journals including in Addictive Behaviors, Journal of Addictive Diseases, Journal of Adolescent Health, Pediatrics, and Archives of Adolescent and Pediatric Medicine.

Thursday, March 21, 2019, 3-5pm

Dr. Tim Moore, "The Opioid Crisis: Insights from Other Illicit Drug Epidemics"

Department of Economics, Purdue University

Comparing and contrasting the Opioid Crisis with past illicit drug epidemics can be useful for thinking about how it may evolve and what policy responses could be most effective. In this talk, I will describe some of the key aspects of the Opioid Crisis and previous epidemics, focusing on two epidemics that I have direct research on: an opioid crisis that occurred in Australia in the 1990s, and the U.S. crack cocaine epidemic. I will then consider what is different and what may be similar about this current epidemic, and what that suggests about policy options and responses.

Tim Moore is an associate professor in the Department of Economics at Purdue University and a research associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research. Tim was previously a faculty member in the economics departments at the University of Melbourne and at George Washington University. Tim's last job before undertaking his PhD was at a drug and alcohol agency in Australia, doing illicit drug policy analysis. His research interests include the economics of illicit drug markets, social insurance, and how economic activity affects health outcomes.