Sehr geehrte Damen und Herren, dear colleagues, in the name of the Department of Economics, I cordially invite you to our research seminar March, 17th, 2021, 4pm Manasvini Singh https://www.manasvinisingh.com <https://www.manasvinisingh.com/> Who Cares? Heterogeneous Response to Formal Feedback Abstract: Physician quality “report cards” are popular measures used by states and insurers to, amongst other things, incentivize physicians to improve care quality by publicly evaluating them on specific clinical outcomes. However, research suggests that report cards are less effective than expected, inducing only small improvements in care quality. The goal of this study is to examine whether this lackluster effect occurs due to heterogeneity in physician response to report cards, which would help inform the design of future quality improvement interventions. I examine this question by exploiting the release of the ProPublica Surgeon Report Card, which was released only in 2015 and graded all surgeons who performed eight elective Medicare surgeries on outcomes such as in-hospital mortality and readmission rates. I estimate the within-physician effects of the report card on physician behavior for Medicare and non-Medicare patients with a combined difference-in-difference and regression-discontinuity research design, using inpatient administrative data from the state of Florida (~3Mil encounters, 2012-17). I then identify physicians who are more or less likely to respond to the report card (“learners” and “non-learners”, respectively) using each physician’s past history of learning from their own and others’ successes and failures in the eight key surgeries. Results show that, on average, the report card improved physicians’ performance on key outcomes for the eight Medicare surgeries compared to other elective surgeries, and had positive spillovers on non-Medicare surgeries. This effect persisted several years after the release of the report card, suggesting that even solitary information shocks can have lasting effects on physician behavior. Examining heterogeneous responses, I find that physicians’ past learning propensities positively predicted the extent to which they responded to report card information, though this effect was moderated by several market-level factors. Manasvini Singh is Assistant Professor at University of Massachusetts Amherst. She is interested in how physicians make decisions, and the effects of organizational and policy environments on such decisions. Her research has been featured, inter alia, in the NYT, https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/20/upshot/mental-shortcuts-medical-errors.ht... <https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/20/upshot/mental-shortcuts-medical-errors.html>. Registration for the zoom link at https://www.jku.at/en/department-of-economics/research/research-events/onlin... <https://www.jku.at/en/department-of-economics/research/research-events/online-research-seminar/> You will find the schedule for the summer term at https://www.jku.at/en/department-of-economics/research/research-events/more-... <https://www.jku.at/en/department-of-economics/research/research-events/more-details-about-the-online-economics-research-seminar/> With best regards, rené böheim — PD René Böheim, PhD Department of Economics JOHANNES KEPLER UNIVERSITÄT LINZ Altenberger Straße 69 4040 Linz, Österreich P +43-732-2468-7369