About Aaron

Aaron Blaakman is a Health Economics and Financing Research Consultant with extensive expertise in Africa and other international venues. Aaron P. Beaston-Blaakman’s most recent domestic project, “A Conceptual and Empirical Analysis of Costing Methodologies in Substance Abuse Treatment,” was funded by the NIH National Institute on Drug Abuse for three years, 2004 through 2007.

Research Positions and Projects
Aaron Blaakman has held several research positions over the last decade. From 2005 to 2008, he held the position of Scientist I in Economics at Family Health International, Durham, N.C. While there, Aaron P. Beaston-Blaakman acted as principal investigator on the NIH project. He also conducted cost analysis of peer education, family planning, screening and other health and human services initiatives in Guinea, Kenya, Mali, South Africa, Senegal, Uganda and Zambia.

From 1998 to 2005, Aaron Blaakman was a research associate conducting substance abuse and international health cost and cost-effectiveness analysis at Brandeis University, Schneider Institute for Health Policy and Heller School for Social Policy and Management in Massachusetts. While there, Aaron P. Beaston-Blaakman worked on the NIH project as well as many other cost-analysis projects concerning substance abuse and other health issues. From 2000 to 20003 he was also the principal investigator of a seed grant for the Heller School for Advanced Studies in Social Welfare; the proposal was a strategic collaboration between the Heller School, Acre Family Day Care and the community of Lowell, Mass.

Prior to that, Aaron P. Beaston-Blaakman was a program evaluation director at Charles River Health Management in Boston.

Aaron Blaakman has additionally conducted cost-analysis consulting projects for Texas Christian University; the Family First Project; the University of North Carolina School of Medicine; the University of Massachusetts Medical Center; Columbia University’s National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse; Mt. Sinai Medical Center; and many others.

Academic Staff Experience
From 1999 to 2000, Aaron P. Beaston-Blaakman was an adjunct professor of health policy at Tufts University Experimental College in Medford, Mass. In 1999, he also took his expertise to Dakar, Senegal, where he served as an adjunct lecturer in Cost-Effectiveness Analysis at the Centre D’Etudes Supérieurs en Gestion. Aaron P. Beaston-Blaakman was also an instructor in the Sustainable International Development Program at Brandeis University from 1998 to 1999. In 1998, he was an adjunct lecturer at Boston’s Emmanuel College within the Healthcare Administration Program.

Social Work and Clinical Experience
Aaron P. Beaston-Blaakman has hands-on clinical experience as well. From 1993 to 1994, he held several positions at the Hillside Children’s Center in Rochester, N.Y., including program assistant, juvenile justice social worker, sociotherapist and recreation therapist.

Education
Aaron P. Beaston-Blaakman earned his PhD in Social Policy with concentration in Health Economics and Finance from the Heller School for Social Policy and Management at Brandeis University. His dissertation focused on advancing economic analysis of substance abuse treatment. Aaron P. Beaston-Blaakman also holds a master’s degree in Social Policy from Brandeis. At Syracuse University, N.Y., Aaron P. Beaston-Blaakman earned an MPA from the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs and an MSW from the School of Social Work. Aaron P. Beaston-Blaakman earned his bachelor’s degree in Economics and French at Fordham University, New York.

Publications and Honors
Aaron P. Beaston-Blaakman authored a review on the 2006 book, "Better but not well: mental health policy in the United States since 1950."  The review was published in the peer-reviewed Journal of Mental Health Policy Economics, Sept. 10, 2007.

Aaron P. Beaston-Blaakman is a joint author of many articles, including:

•    “Effectiveness of training supervisors to improve reproductive health quality of care: a cluster-randomized trial in Kenya,” Health Policy Plan, 2008.

•    “Cost-effectiveness of clinical interventions for AIDS wasting,” AIDS Care, 2007.

•    “Organizational and Client Determinants of Cost in Outpatient Substance Abuse Treatment,” Journal of Mental Health Policy Economics, 2007

•    “Racial and ethnic differences in health and health care:  Lessons from an inner-city patient population actively using heroin and cocaine,” Journal of Ethnicity in Substance Abuse, 2006.
 
•    “Unmet need for substance abuse treatment of adults in Massachusetts,” Administration and Policy in Mental Health 32(4):403-426, 2005.

Aaron P. Beaston-Blaakman was named a University Fellow at Syracuse University, Academic Year 1995-1996. He also received the Masters Prize, Convocation 1996, at Syracuse University’s School of Social Work. And in 1995, Aaron P. Beaston-Blaakman was named the Mark and Pearle Clements Intern Scholar, Seoul, Korea.

Aaron P. Beaston-Blaakman is fluent in French and lives in Cary, N.C.

Aaron P. Beaston-Blaakman is skilled in relevant software programs including Microsoft Office, SPSS, SAS and Wesvar.

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