This year, AcademyHealth and the Commonwealth Fund invited a group of early-career scholars to join a day of international health policy programming at the 2026 Annual Research Meeting (ARM), with scholarship support to help cover their attendance. This post is one in a series of their reflections on what they learned from researchers and health systems around the world, and what it might mean for improving health care here in the U.S. See the other posts by Natalia Patritti Cram, Claire Pernat, Syed Hussain, and Laura Jacobson.
In this video, Laura Yudo, a Master of Healthcare Administration candidate, reflects on what she learned at AcademyHealth's Annual Research Meeting (ARM). She came in expecting a debate about which country's health system is "best," but found the more useful comparisons were about specific policies: how countries finance care, respond to workforce shortages, and expand access under real constraints. She also shares how a poster on hospital financing shaped her thinking about the connection between research and healthcare management, and makes the case for bringing more administrators into research-focused spaces like ARM.
Supported by the Commonwealth Fund, a national, private foundation based in New York City that supports independent research on health care issues and makes grants to improve health care practice and policy. The views presented here are those of the author and not necessarily those of the Commonwealth Fund, its directors, officers, or staff.