Thomas Mason

Education

BA(Hons) Economics and Politics, MSc Economics, PhD in Health Economics (University of Manchester, 2019); Fellow of the Higher Education Academy (FHEA)

MSc modules: Microeconomics; Macroeconomics; Time-series Analysis; Cross-Section Econometrics; Applied Econometrics; Mathematics in Economics; Financial Economics; Mechanism Design and Auction Theory

MSc thesis: Intergenerational transmission of drinking behaviours: an application using instrumental variables in the Health Survey for England

PhD thesis: Substance misuse related hospital admissions, costs and treatment outcomes: econometric analysis of administrative data for England. Download (PDF)

Appointments

• Senior Lecturer (Associate Professor (with tenure)) in Health Economics, Lancaster University, 2022-present.
• Research Fellow (Health Economics) and Lecturer (MSc Economics), University of Manchester, 2020-2022.
• Senior Research Analyst, HEOR Ltd. (private-sector consultancy), 2018-2020.
• Research Associate, then Research Fellow, University of Manchester, October 2010-2018.

Tom is or has been a co-investigator on over £13m of externally awarded research funding, from funders including the NIHR, MRC, the DHSC Policy Research Programme and NHS England. His current externally funded projects include:

The effects of regional economic policy on economic and health outcomes

Tom leads a quantitative evaluation of the economic, equity and health effects of regional economic policy (community wealth building), using modern econometric approaches including generalised synthetic control and Callaway and Sant'Anna difference-in-differences (NIHR169449, £1.6m).

The effects of care continuity under task substitution from physicians to nurse practitioners in primary care

Tom is a co-investigator on a study estimating the effects of nurse practitioner continuity of care on patient outcomes and health care use under task substitution (chronic disease management), using propensity score matching and large-scale linked individual-level primary and secondary care data with national coverage (NIHR Three Schools follow-on prevention award, £100k).

The economics of addiction

Tom co-leads the drug and alcohol theme of the Lancaster NIHR Mental Health Research Group, quantifying the economic and health consequences of co-occurring acute mental health and addiction disorders (NIHR502773, £11.3m).

Tom is co-Director of Research in the Division of Health Research at Lancaster University, and a member of the NIHR Public Health Research Programme Funding Committee, providing economics expertise. He is co-convenor of the economics network for the NIHR School for Public Health Research, and co-ordinates the international health economics mailing list on JISCMail. He is an Honorary Fellow of the University of Manchester and an Affiliate of The Work Foundation, a labour-market and employment think tank.

His research has informed national policy and NHS decision-making. A public health resource allocation formula he co-developed was adopted by the Department of Health as the basis for target allocations of the public health grant from 2016, and his evaluations have been commissioned by and reported to bodies including NHS England, the Department of Health and the Home Office.

The labour market in the health sector

Tom's research into the health care labour market includes developing the methodological approaches taken in planning the size and shape of the future workforce.

• Mason T, Sutton M, Whittaker W, Birch S. Exploring the limitations of age-based models for health care planning. Social Science & Medicine, 2015. doi:10.1016/j.socscimed.2015.03.005
• Urwin S, Lau Y-S, Mason T. Investigating the relationship between formal and informal care: an application using panel data for people living together. Health Economics, 2019. doi:10.1002/hec.3887
• Birch S, Tomblin Murphy G, MacKenzie A, Whittaker W, Mason T. Will the need-based planning of health human resources currently undertaken in several countries lead to excess supply and inefficiency? A comment on Basu and Pak. Health Economics, 2017. doi:10.1002/hec.3370
• Birch S, Mason T, Sutton M, Whittaker W. Not enough doctors or not enough needs? Refocusing health workforce planning from providers and services to populations and needs. Journal of Health Services Research and Policy, 2013. doi:10.1177/1355819612473592
• Al Dhuhaibat A, Mason T, Koornneef E. The economic impact of medical scribe provision on physician productivity in outpatient clinics: a scoping review. Cost Effectiveness and Resource Allocation, 2026. doi:10.1186/s12962-026-00764-7

Incentives and provider behaviour

• Mason T, Whittaker W, Jones A, Sutton M. Did paying drugs misuse treatment providers for outcomes lead to unintended consequences for hospital admissions? Difference-in-differences analysis of a pay-for-performance scheme in England. Addiction, 2021. doi:10.1111/add.15486
• Mason T, Lau Y-S, Sutton M. Is the distribution of care quality provided under pay-for-performance equitable? Evidence from the Advancing Quality programme in England. International Journal for Equity in Health, 2016. doi:10.1186/s12939-016-0434-5
• Mason T, Sutton M, Whittaker W, et al. The impact of paying treatment providers for outcomes: difference-in-differences analysis of the 'payment by results for drugs recovery' pilot. Addiction, 2015. doi:10.1111/add.12920 (Shortlisted, EMCDDA Scientific Committee award, 2016.)
• Jones A, Pierce M, Sutton M, Mason T, Millar T. Does paying service providers by results improve recovery outcomes for drug misusers in treatment in England? Addiction, 2018. doi:10.1111/add.13960
• McDonald R, Boaden R, Roland M, … Mason T, et al. A qualitative and quantitative evaluation of the Advancing Quality pay-for-performance programme in the NHS North West. Health Services and Delivery Research, 2015. doi:10.3310/hsdr03230
• Allen T, Mason T, Whittaker W. Impacts of pay for performance on the quality of primary care. Risk Management and Healthcare Policy, 2014. doi:10.2147/RMHP.S46423

Regional policy and resource allocation

• Jones A, Hayhurst K, Whittaker W, Mason T, Sutton M. Development of a resource allocation formula for substance misuse treatment services. Journal of Public Health, 2018. doi:10.1093/pubmed/fdx160
• Whittaker W, Hayhurst K, Jones A, Mason T, Sutton M. Resource Allocation for Local Public Health. Report for the Department of Health, 2015. Report (PDF)
• Hammond J, Lorne C, Coleman A, … Mason T, et al. The spatial politics of place and health policy: exploring Sustainability and Transformation Plans in the English NHS. Social Science & Medicine, 2017. doi:10.1016/j.socscimed.2017.08.007

The organisation and delivery of health services

• Mason T, Jones C, Sutton M, et al. Retrospective economic analysis of the transfer of services from hospitals to the community: an application to an enhanced eye care service. BMJ Open, 2017. doi:10.1136/bmjopen-2016-014089
• Ackerley S, Mason T, Partington A, et al. Can we enhance neurorehabilitation through regional implementation of group-based telerehabilitation? BMJ Open, 2026. doi:10.1136/bmjopen-2025-101820
• Hammond J, Mason T, Sutton M, et al. Exploring the impacts of the 2012 Health and Social Care Act reforms to commissioning on clinical activity in the English NHS: a mixed methods study of cervical screening. BMJ Open, 2019. doi:10.1136/bmjopen-2018-024156

Applied machine learning

• Gordon J, Norman M, Hurst M, Mason T, et al. Using machine learning to predict anticoagulation control in atrial fibrillation: a UK Clinical Practice Research Datalink study. Informatics in Medicine Unlocked, 2021. doi:10.1016/j.imu.2021.100688

Inequalities in chronic disease

• Mason T, Whittaker W, Dumville JC, Bower P. Variation in appropriate diabetes care and treatment targets in urban and rural areas in England: an observational study of the 'rule of halves'. BMJ Open, 2022. doi:10.1136/bmjopen-2021-057244
• Chatzi G, Whittaker W, Chandola T, Mason T, et al. Could diabetes prevention programmes result in the widening of sociodemographic inequalities in type 2 diabetes? Comparison of survey and administrative data for England. Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health, 2023. doi:10.1136/jech-2022-219654
• Chatzi G, Mason T, Chandola T, et al. Sociodemographic disparities in non-diabetic hyperglycaemia and the transition to type 2 diabetes: evidence from the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing. Diabetic Medicine, 2020. doi:10.1111/dme.14343

Research methods and evidence synthesis

• Urwin S, Mason T, Whittaker W. Do different means of recording sexual orientation affect its relationship with health and wellbeing? Health Economics, 2021. doi:10.1002/hec.4422
• Lam CHM, Mason T, Hollingsworth B. Measuring performance in cancer services during COVID-19 and beyond: a novel case throughput metric using NHS Cancer Waiting Times data. Journal of Public Health, 2026. doi:10.1093/pubmed/fdag041
• Lam CHM, Cheung KC, Mason T, Hollingsworth B. COVID-19's disruptions to cancer care pathways and widening of health inequalities in the UK: a systematic review. BMC Health Services Research, 2026. doi:10.1186/s12913-026-14313-8
• Alqawasmeh KA, Mason T, Morris A, et al. Facilitators and barriers to generic and biosimilar medications in the Middle East and North Africa: insights from physicians and pharmacists — a systematic review. European Journal of Clinical Pharmacology, 2025. doi:10.1007/s00228-025-03819-5
• Norman G, Mason T, Dumville JC, Bower P, Wilson P, Cullum N. Approaches to enabling rapid evaluation of innovations in health and social care: a scoping review of evidence from high-income countries. BMJ Open, 2022. doi:10.1136/bmjopen-2022-064345

Teaching

Tom's current and past taught modules: Econometrics (BSc Economics); Economics of Health (MSc Economics); Applied Health Economics (PhD and MSc in Health Economics and Policy); Data Analysis (PhD and MSc in Health Economics and Policy).

PhD supervision

Tom currently supervises PhD students on a range of topics across his research expertise, including estimating the effects of AI-assisted diagnosis in breast cancer screening, the impacts of admission to hospital at the weekend or weeknight for emergency care outcomes, the productivity impacts of the adoption of scribes in secondary care, and the effects of COVID-19 on inequalities in cancer care in England. He is happy to accept enquiries for PhD study on questions across his research interests.