Vanderbilt Economic Modeling Fellowship

May 2025

Program Overview

This fellowship program offers an advanced exploration into decision analytic economic evaluation methods. The program builds off previous training through D2P Economic Evaluation Workshops (Thailand 2022, Türkiye 2024) which focused on formulating a decision problem, building decision trees and developing Markov models. This advanced training incorporates additional modeling approaches and advanced modeling methods including calibration and validation of models, uncertainty analysis, calibration, and value of information analysis.

While we emphasize practical application, the understanding of fundamental theoretical concepts and modeling skills is also highlighted. Fellows will take on a Capstone Project drawn from a real-world decision problem in a clinical or policy context to the development of a fully-fledged model. This hands-on project takes fellows through all stages of research, from formulating a question to presenting the final results, which may also lead to stakeholder-ready models and potential manuscript development.

Throughout the fellowship, technical modeling material and capstone work is augmented with guest lectures and practical instruction on leadership skills for maximizing impact of economic evaluations.

Arrival And Logistics Information

Preparing for Your Capstone

Introductory Presentation Template

Final Presentation Template

Overarching Goals

  • Decision impact: Have an economic evaluation that can inform a decision
  • Capacity strengthening: Have highly-trained individuals in government officers

Program Structure

The fellowship program will adopt a blend of:

  • In-Class Lectures: Foundational knowledge and concepts will be shared
  • Modeling Clinics: Hands-on experience in modeling and other practical exercises
  • Final Capstone: Development of a fully-fledged model, policy brief and presentation
  • Individual Presentations: For sharing research ideas, projects in progress, and final results. These in-class presentations will allow for constructive comments both on the substance of the research and on presentation style. Fellows will not only present their own work but also practice providing critical feedback to their peers.
  • Mentorship: Fellows will have access to numerous Vanderbilt faculty and staff to promote their economic evaluation skill development and support career development. Because the fellowship is located at a large teaching hospital, fellows will also have access to clinical expertise relevant to the underlying health conditions. Fellows will be exposed to a diverse array of invited guest lecturers to expand their networks.
  • Additional Professional Development Opportunities: This fellowship program is also intended to bolster and further develop the skill sets necessary for a grant proposal for submission, effective communication, mentorship, etc.

Learning Objectives

Upon successful completion of this program, students will be able to:

  • Understand and apply state-of-the-art modeling methods to evaluate the comparative effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of health interventions
  • Formulate a clinical or public health question in a decision-analytic framework
  • Design and program a decision-analytic model, estimate model parameters using available epidemiological, clinical, and economic data, and become familiar with the process of model debugging
  • Exercise oral presentation skills of research ideas, works-in-progress, and final analysis
  • Critically appraise and provide constructive feedback on other decision analysis projects
  • Compose a journal-style report of the decision analysis

Schedule

Date Workshop Times & Topics Notes
Week One
Saturday, May 3 Fellows arrive
Sunday, May 4 5:00 - 8:00pm Welcome Dinner and Orientation at Barcelona

Location: Barcelona, 1200 Villa Place, Suite 110, Nashville, TN 37212

(MEET IN THE LOBBY OF THE BROADVIEW AT 5:15 pm AND WE WILL WALK TOGETHER)

Group Dinner Menu – Please Let us know if you have food allergies!
Monday, May 5

9:00-12:00pm - Recap of previous D2P Economic Modeling Workshops

1:15 – 2:45 – Fellow Introductions and Presentations (Part 1)

3:00 – 4:30pm - Campus & Medical Center Tour

Anna Clarke Paxton and GPED student
Tuesday, May 6

9:00-12:00pm - Recap of previous D2P Economic Modeling Workshops

1:00 – 2:45 – Fellow Presentations (Part 2)

3:00-4:30pm - Searching the literature

Philip Walker, Eskind Biomedical Library

Amua - Decision Tree Case Study

Amua - Markov Alive-Dead Model
Wednesday, May 7

9:00-10:00pm – Tufts Global Health CEA Registry

Recorded video of Peter’s talk

Yan’s slides

Recorded video of Yan’s talk

11:00am – 2:30pm - Work on Capstone Model (lunch on your own)

2:30pm - Capstone Presentations

Lecturer: Peter Neumann, Ph.D. (Tufts University)

Visiting Researcher: Xiaoyan Wang, MPH (Tufts)
Thursday, May 8

9:00-12:00pm – Modeling Clinic: Sensitivity and Uncertainty Analysis (Leech)

Calibration and Validation (Zhu)

1:00 – 2:45 – Zach Ward, Global Maternal Health Modeling

3:00-4:30pm - Read, Review, and Publish Scientific Literature (Elizabeth Rose)

Visiting Lecturer: Zach Ward (Harvard University School of Public Health)

Calibration: Before vs. After

PSA Distribution Solver
Friday, May 9

9:00-11:00am – Modeling in Amua (Zach Ward)

11:00am – 4:30pm – Work on Capstone Project and Meetings with Dr. Ward

1:00 - 2:30 Finish Initial Presentations

2:30 - 4:00pm MPH Graduation Party (1st Floor Lobby of 2525 West End Ave [our workshop building]

(Note: Vanderbilt graduation occurs today, so campus will be quite busy!)

Visiting Lecturer: Zach Ward (Harvard University School of Public Health)

Example Amua Model
Saturday, May 10
Sunday, May 11
Week Two
Monday, May 12

9:00-12:00pm –

Curating and Transforming Model Parameters (Graves)

Structuring the Markov Model: Group Exercise

Capstone Model

10:00 - 11:00am Global Health Grand Rounds - “Developing a Point of Care Breast Cancer Detection Kit for Use in Resource Limited Areas” (virtual)

Registration link

1:00 – 2:45 – Work on Capstone Model

3:00 – 4:00pm - Guest Speaker: Alison Fahey, J-PAL

Alison’s slides

Visiting Lecturer: Alison Fahey, Director of Partnerships and Strategic Initiatives, Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (Massachusetts Institute of Technology)

J-PAL Opportunities
Tuesday, May 13

9:00 – 11:30am – Work on Capstone Model

11:30-1:00pm – Guest Lecture – Distributional and Extended Cost-Effectiveness Analysis (Pandya)

2:00 – 2:45 – Work on Capstone Project and Meetings with Dr. Pandya

3:00-4:30pm -

Citation Managers (Mendeley, Zotero)

Zotero slides

Mendeley slides

Eskind Biomedical Library (confirmed)

 Visiting Lecturer: Ankur Pandya, Harvard School of Public Health
Wednesday, May 14

9:00-1:00pm – Work on Capstone Project

6:00pm - Nashville SC vs. New York City Redbulls at GEODIS Park
Thursday, May 15

9:00-1:00pm – Work on Capstone Project

3:00 - 4:00pm – Effective Leadership Skills - Elizabeth Rose
Friday, May 16

9:00-1:00pm - Work on Capstone Project

11:00am-12:30pm - Data Visualization - Kim Lovell (VUMC)

1:30pm Advanced Literature Search Skills - Emily Adydan (Eskind Biomedical Library)

PICO Template

Recorded video

5:00 - 9:00pm Musicians Corner (free concert at Centennial Park, across the street from the office work space)
Saturday, May 17 12:00 - 5:00pm Musicians Corner (free concert at Centennial Park, across the street from the office work space)
Sunday, May 18
Week Three
Monday, May 19

9:00-1:00pm - Work on Capstone Project

3:00-4:30pm

Effective Practices in Mentoring - Marie Martin
Tuesday, May 20

9:00-11:00am - Practice Presentations in Small Groups (3-4/group).

11:00 - 4:00pm - Work on Capstone Project
Wednesday, May 21

9:00-4:00pm - Presentations

A World Tour of Economic Evaluation (John)

Mike
Kasusu
Lawrence 
Doris
Susan 
Roderick
Kabelele
Poy
Sohel
Leigh
Andrea

6:00pm Final Dinner at the Broadview
Thursday, May 22 9:00 – 11:00am Breakfast Celebration & Certificate Ceremony (location: Centennial Perk, 8th floor reception space)
Friday, May 23 Travel home