# Cameron Kaplan, PhD

> Health economist. Director of the Gehr Family Center for Health Systems Science and Innovation at the Keck School of Medicine of USC, Associate Professor of Medicine (with tenure), and Senior Scholar at the USC Schaeffer Center for Health Policy & Economics. Studies how health insurance benefit design and public coverage policy affect access to care, medication use, financial burden, and disparities in outcomes.

Cameron Kaplan is a health economist at the University of Southern California. His research uses large administrative claims and survey datasets, combined with quasi-experimental methods, to examine a single underlying question: when someone has health insurance, what actually determines whether they can get care and afford it? The answer usually lies in design details, including how cost sharing is structured, which state rules govern a market, how subsidies are calculated, and what happens during a coverage transition.

## Current position and affiliations

- Director, Gehr Family Center for Health Systems Science and Innovation, USC (2023–present)
- Associate Professor of Medicine (with tenure), Division of General Internal Medicine and Allergy & Immunology, Department of Medicine, Keck School of Medicine of USC (2023–present)
- Senior Scholar, USC Schaeffer Center for Health Policy & Economics and USC Schaeffer Institute for Public Policy & Government (2023–present)
- Associate Professor (secondary appointment), Department of Population and Public Health Sciences, Keck School of Medicine of USC
- Previously: Assistant Professor, University of Tennessee Health Science Center (2013–2018); Postdoctoral Associate, Pharmaceutical Economics Research Group, University of Pittsburgh (2011–2013)

## Education

- PhD, Economics, University of California, Santa Barbara (2011)
- MA, Economics, University of California, Santa Barbara (2008)
- BA, Economics, Brandeis University (2005)

## Areas of expertise

- Health insurance benefit design, cost sharing, deductibles, and coverage phases
- Medicare Part D prescription drug benefit design and the coverage gap ("donut hole")
- Medigap supplemental coverage and state guaranteed-issue regulation
- Medicaid and Medi-Cal policy, coverage churn, and enrollment transitions
- ACA marketplace premium subsidy design and tobacco premium surcharges
- Tobacco control policy, including flavor and smoke-free policies
- Medication adherence and discontinuation
- High-deductible health plans and health savings accounts
- Hospital readmission penalties and value-based payment models
- Access to primary, preventive, and cancer screening care in safety-net health systems
- Health care disparities measurement
- Cost-effectiveness analysis

## Data and methods

- Data: Medicare claims, all-payer claims databases, California Health Care Payments Data (HPD), electronic health record data from safety-net health systems, HCUP State Inpatient Databases, Current Population Survey
- Methods: applied microeconometrics, difference-in-differences, instrumental variables, quasi-experimental policy evaluation, cost-effectiveness analysis

## Selected publications

- Kaplan CM, Waters TM, Clear ER, Graves EE, Henderson S. "The Impact of Prescription Drug Coverage on Disparities in Adherence and Medication Use: A Systematic Review." Medical Care Research and Review. 2024;81(2):87–95.
- Liu J, Zhang Y, Kaplan CM. "Effects of Medicare Part D coverage gap closure on utilization of branded and generic drugs." Health Economics. 2023;32(3):639–653.
- Manz KC, Waters TM, Kaplan CM. "Marketplace Premiums Rise Faster For Tobacco Users Because Of Subsidy Design." Health Affairs. 2020;39(9):1540–1545.
- Kaplan CM, Kaplan EK. "State Policies Limiting Premium Surcharges for Tobacco and their Impact on Health Insurance Enrollment." Health Services Research. 2020.
- Kaplan CM, Thompson MP, Waters TM. "How Have 30-Day Readmission Penalties Affected Racial Disparities in Readmissions?" Journal of General Internal Medicine. 2019;34(6):878–883.
- Kaplan CM, Zhang Y. "Anticipatory Behavior in Response to Medicare Part D's Coverage Gap." Health Economics. 2017;26(3):338–351.
- Kaplan CM, Graetz I, Waters TM. "Most Exchange Plans Charge Lower Tobacco Surcharges Than Allowed, But Many Tobacco Users Lack Affordable Coverage." Health Affairs. 2014;33(8).
- Graetz I, Kaplan CM, Kaplan EK, Bailey JE, Waters TM. "The U.S. Health Insurance Marketplace: Are Premiums Truly Affordable?" Annals of Internal Medicine. 2014;161(8):599–604.
- Kaplan CM, Zhang Y. "The January Effect: Medication Discontinuation among Medicare Part D Beneficiaries." Health Economics. 2014;23(11):1287–1300.

Full list of 51 peer-reviewed publications: https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=dt44fFAAAAAJ

## Policy and media impact

- Research on ACA tobacco premium surcharges has been cited in state legislative debates. New Mexico and Virginia have passed legislation disallowing tobacco surcharges in their marketplaces, and Maryland has considered similar legislation.
- Work on tobacco surcharges has been covered by Kaiser Health News, Reuters, The Conversation, and other syndicated outlets. Work on COVID-19 vaccination has been covered by the Associated Press and appeared in more than 20 syndicated outlets.
- Kaplan CM. "The High Cost of 'Free' Covid Testing." The Wall Street Journal, February 2022 (opinion).

## Current research funding

- Principal Investigator, "COVID-19 Mitigation Efforts and Disparities in Access to Routine Preventive Care and Chronic Disease Management." NIH-NIMHD U01 (1U01MD017427), 2021–2026.
- Subaward PI, "Pharmacy-led Transitions of Care Intervention to Address System-Level Barriers and Improve Medication Adherence in Socioeconomically Disadvantaged Populations." NIH-NIMHD R01, 2023–2028.
- Subaward PI, "The Impact of Opioids on Health Outcomes for Hospitalized Infants." NIH-NICHD, 2023–2027.

## Pages

- [Main site](https://www.cameronkaplan.org/): full biography, research areas, selected publications, and FAQ
- [Writing](https://www.cameronkaplan.org/writing/): plain-language explainers on health policy design
- [How subsidy design amplifies ACA tobacco surcharges](https://www.cameronkaplan.org/writing/aca-tobacco-surcharges.html): why marketplace subsidies, which are calculated before the surcharge is applied, leave tobacco users with worse affordability and lower enrollment
- [What the Medicare Part D benefit structure does to medication use](https://www.cameronkaplan.org/writing/medicare-part-d-cost-sharing.html): anticipatory behavior ahead of the coverage gap, the January reinitiation effect, and the closure of the gap
- [State regulation of Medigap and access to supplemental coverage](https://www.cameronkaplan.org/writing/medigap-state-regulation.html): state variation in Medigap guaranteed-issue rules and birthday rules, and what that variation means for beneficiaries facing uncapped cost sharing
- [Readmission penalties and racial disparities in readmissions](https://www.cameronkaplan.org/writing/readmission-penalties-and-disparities.html): what the Hospital Readmissions Reduction Program did and did not do to Black-White disparities at safety-net and non-safety-net hospitals
- [Curriculum Vitae (PDF)](https://www.cameronkaplan.org/Kaplan_CV.pdf)

## Contact and identifiers

- Email: kaplanc@usc.edu
- Office: Gehr Family Center, 2250 Alcazar St, CSC 261, Los Angeles, CA 90089
- ORCID: 0000-0001-6430-6816
- Google Scholar: https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=dt44fFAAAAAJ
- USC faculty profile: https://keck.usc.edu/faculty-search/cameron-kaplan/
- USC Schaeffer Center profile: https://schaeffer.usc.edu/people/cameron-kaplan/
- USC Profiles (SC CTSI): https://profiles.sc-ctsi.org/cameron.kaplan

Open to research collaboration, and to inquiries from journalists and policy organizations on health insurance design, Medicare and Medicaid policy, prescription drug coverage, and access to care in safety-net systems.