Harkness Project Title: The Reliability of Health Care Utilization Databases for Decisionmaking to Improve Health of Priority Populations and Patient Safety

Placement: Stanford University

Mentor: John Ioannidis, Stanford University

Biography at time of Harkness Fellowship: Lars Hemkens, Dr.med., a 2011-12 German Harkness Fellow in Health Care Policy and Practice, is a research fellow at the German Institute for Quality and Efficiency in Health Care (IQWiG). Previous positions include research fellow at DIeM—Institute for Evidence-Based Medicine, Cologne, and staff physician in internal medicine at St. Franziskus Hospital. His work includes methods of evidence‐based medicine and evidence‐based health care, systematic reviews and benefit assessments (HTA‐reports / CER‐reports) in diabetes and hypertension, and research using routinely collected patient data to assess the safety of diabetic treatments. He led a milestone and very controversial study (Hemkens LG, et al "Risk of malignancies in patients with diabetes treated with human insulin or insulin analogues: a cohort study," Diabetologia 2009), which generated widespread debate and has stimulated more definitive studies. He has authored and co-authored several peer-reviewed publications and IQWiG reports. Hemkens hold a Dr.med. From the University of Cologne, and an M.P.H., Heinrich Heine University, Düsseldorf.

Current Position: Research Fellow at the German Institute for Quality and Efficiency in Health Care (IQWiG).

Email: lars.hemkens@hemkens.de