David C. Lee, MD

My research uses big data, in the form of large administrative claims databases, and geospatial analysis to analyze patterns of health care use in millions of emergency department users. I have previously studied hospital closures to predict how they affect hospital-based care. I have also analyzed how natural disasters affect health care delivery and use of emergency care services.

My current research pursuits include studying diabetes among urban minorities and also rural communities. In studies funded by the National Institutes of Health, I will be identifying how the food environment, diet quality, and dietary chemical exposures increase the risk of diabetes among rural communities and how to connect urban emergency department patients with newly diagnosed diabetes to outpatient follow-up care.

By using geospatial analysis and data on the one in five Americans who visits an emergency department each year, I am working to develop new approaches of measuring health at a local geographic level to understand how to better serve the communities around us. I look forward to the day when the combination of big data and geographic analysis transforms our health care system into one that does more than just provide health care but delivers better health for the population as a whole.