American University of Armenia Organizes Conference on Global Cost of Correcting Refractive Errors

Dr. Kevin Frick, Noted Expert from Johns Hopkins School of Public Health Invited to Present by AUA’s Meghrigian Institute for Preventive Ophthalmology

The American University of Armenia’s Meghrigian Institute for Preventive Ophthalmology of the College of Health Sciences organized a Public Health Seminar on July 26, 2012. During the seminar Dr. Kevin D. Frick presented his work about the global burden of visual impairment from uncorrected refractive errors and cost-effectiveness of interventions correcting refractive errors. Dr. Frick is a Professor in the Departments of Health Policy and Management and International Health at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in Baltimore, Maryland, USA. He has joint appointments in the Schools of Medicine and Nursing at Johns Hopkins University.

Professor Frick is an internationally respected health economist who visited AUA to teach the course Economic Evaluation Methods in Healthcare – Understanding Cost-Effectiveness. He combines his knowledge of economic analysis with clinical and epidemiological insights from his colleagues to produce cost-effectiveness analyses that bring the tools of economic decision making to policy-makers. He has been extensively involved in estimating the burden of different forms of visual impairment in different regions in the world and has collaborated in a group that outlined state-of-the-art methods for calculating the costs of blindness in populations. He has published over 100 peer-reviewed publications, including several international cost-benefit and cost-effectiveness studies and framework papers on blinding trachoma, and is extending his work to include vision care services in the United States. Professor Frick earned his PhD in Economics and Health Services Organization and Policy and MA in Economics from the University of Michigan.

AUA students, graduates, researchers, and faculty and ophthalmologists from different organizations attended the public seminar.

The American University of Armenia (AUA) is a private, independent university located in Yerevan, Armenia. Founded in 1991, AUA is affiliated with the University of California. Through teaching, research, and public service, AUA serves Armenia and the region by supplying high-quality, graduate and undergraduate education, encouraging civic engagement, and promoting democratic values.

The American University of Armenia is accredited by the Accrediting Commission for Senior Colleges and Universities of the Western Association of Schools and Colleges, 985 Atlantic Avenue, #100, Alameda, CA 94501, 510-748-9001.

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