Publications from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine provide objective and straightforward advice to decision makers and the public. This site includes Health and Medicine Division (HMD) publications released after 1998. A complete list of HMD’s publications from its establishment in 1970 to the present is available as a PDF.

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  Integrating the Patient and Caregiver Voice into Serious ... Released: July 14, 2017

  Millions of people—infants, children, adults, and their families—are currently coping with serious illness in the United States. Efforts are intensifying to improve overall care quality through the delivery of person-centered and family-oriented services, for patients of all ages and across disease stages, care settings, and specialties. While aging Baby Boomers are increasing the proportion of patients in the Medicare population over time, the sickest and most vulnerable patients needing health system support and other services to meet their complex needs can be found across the age spectrum and in a broad range of care settings, from perinatal care to geriatric care.
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  Health Communication with Immigrants, Refugees, and ... Released: June 02, 2017

  The Roundtable on Health Literacy of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine convened a workshop focused on facilitating health communication with people from immigrant, refugee, and migrant worker populations.
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  Cancer Care in Low-Resource Areas: Cancer Treatment ... Released: May 23, 2017

  Though cancer was once considered to be a problem primarily in wealthy nations, low- and middle-income countries now bear a majority share of the global cancer burden. Disparities in cancer outcomes also exist in high-income countries—communities within wealthier nations can experience worse cancer outcomes, especially if they have challenges in accessing cancer prevention and cancer care services.
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  Communicating Clearly About Medicines: Proceedings of a ... Released: May 16, 2017

  The Roundtable on Health Literacy of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine convened a workshop on communicating clearly about medicines. The workshop focused on the clarity of written information given to patients and consumers as printed or digital materials. The workshop was organized around presentations and panel discussions that explored the design of health-literate written materials and examples that illustrated implementation of research into the development of these materials. The workshop rapporteurs in brief have prepared this proceedings as a factual summation of the session discussions.
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  Health Insurance and Insights from Health Literacy: Helping ... Released: March 13, 2017

  The Roundtable on Health Literacy of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine convened a public workshop to examine health insurance through the lens of health literacy, focusing on literacy related barriers to information and coverage as well as on possible solutions.
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  Therapeutic Development in the Absence of Predictive Animal ... Released: March 10, 2017

  Despite the high prevalence and burden of nervous system disorders, development of new therapeutics lags behind other disease areas. Gaps in understanding the underlying pathophysiology, a dearth of biomarkers, and limitations in the capacity of animal models to predict drug efficacy for human brain disorders have contributed to a high rate of late stage failures in drug development and decreased investment in neuroscience research programs at pharmaceutical companies. On September 12-13, 2016, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine’s Forum on Neuroscience and Nervous System Disorders hosted a public workshop to explore opportunities to accelerate drug development absent predictive animal models.
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  Accounting for Social Risk Factors in Medicare Payment ... Released: January 10, 2017

  The Department of Health and Human Services, acting through the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation, asked the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine to convene an ad hoc committee to identify social risk factors that affect the health outcomes of Medicare beneficiaries and methods to account for these factors in Medicare payment programs.
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  International Perspectives on Integrating Ethical, Legal, and ... Released: January 09, 2017

  Emerging neurotechnologies—devices and techniques designed to collect information about the brain or affect its function—are becoming increasingly important due to scientific and technological advances and a persistent need to develop effective therapies to address the large global burden of neurological and psychiatric disease. The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD)—in collaboration with Arizona State University and the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine—held a workshop in Washington, DC, on Neurotechnology and Society: Strengthening Responsible Innovation in Brain Science.
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  Exploring Strategies to Improve Cardiac Arrest Survival ... Released: December 20, 2016

  Cardiac arrest often strikes seemingly healthy individuals without warning and without regard to age, gender, race, or health status. Following the release of the 2015 Institute of Medicine (IOM) consensus report, Strategies to Improve Cardiac Arrest Survival: A Time to Act, eight sponsors asked the Health and Medicine Division to hold a workshop to assemble diverse stakeholders who would explore the barriers and opportunities for advancing the IOM recommendations.
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  Health Insurance and Insights from Health Literacy: Helping ... Released: December 01, 2016

  The Roundtable on Health Literacy of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine convened a workshop on health literacy in the context of health reform in the United States. The workshop was the most recent health reform–related activity of the roundtable, noted Bernard Rosof of the Quality in HealthCare Advisory Group, in his opening remarks.