faculty honors

Professor Named Editor-in-Chief of Health Services Research

Austin Frakt, research professor of health law, policy & management, aims to increase diversity across the journal’s editorial team.

Austin Frakt, research professor of health law, policy & management, has been named editor-in-chief of Health Services Research (HSR). HSR is the official journal of AcademyHealth, as well as the flagship publication of the Health Research & Educational Trust, a not-for-profit research and education affiliate of the American Hospital Association.

A health economist and director of the Partnered Evidence-based Policy Resource Center at the Boston VA Healthcare System, Frakt began his new role at HSR in January, after serving in several other capacities at the journal as an author, reviewer, editorial board member, and senior associate editor.

“HSR is well situated at the intersection of policy relevance and methodological rigor,” says Frakt. “I’m extremely excited about serving in this role because I see a lot of opportunities for growth at the journal that align with my own skills and interests.”

One of his primary goals is to increase diversity across the editorial team in racial and ethnic representation, as well as in methodological, disciplinary, and geographic areas, and place a greater focus on issues around health equity, racial justice, and the social determinants of health.

“In the healthcare space, we’re seeing a broadening of our understanding of what drives health,” Frakt says. “Hospitals and health systems are not only thinking about what’s happening biologically and in the doctor’s office, but about what’s happening in the community. HSR will parallel these changes and be open to research that thinks more deeply and thoroughly about what drives health to understand where disparities come from.”

This editorial expansion will “require us to be open and honest about systemic racism as an ultimate source of a lot of the disparities,” he says. “This issue is something that we’re recognizing, but it has been absent from a lot of scholarship. Many of us are afraid to even say those words, so I want to break down those barriers and welcome that perspective into the journal.”

Frakt also aims to elevate the impact of the journal by finding ways to translate its policy-relevant content to broader audiences, including policymakers, journalists, and the lay public. He will also focus on improving the author and reviewer experience at HSR by streamlining the review and revision process, thereby and reducing the number of iterations between reviewers and authors and the time from article submission to publication.

Alongside his research (which currently includes topics in opioid use disorder treatment and outcomes and Medicare Advantage), Frakt has dedicated his career to translating and disseminating health economics and policy for mainstream audiences. In addition to his work at HSR, he is the founder and co-editor-in-chief of The Incidental Economist, a blog that features insight and analysis by experts on a range of health policy issues. He is also a senior research scientist in the Department of Health Policy and Management at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, and a frequent contributor on health policy topics to the New York Times’ website The Upshot.