Professional psychologist doctor listening and giving the consult to female patients
Topic

Advance Health & Well-Being

Overview

Good health is important to everyone. Pew conducts research and provides information and fact-based recommendations to state agencies, hospitals, researchers, and other health partners to help them provide better care. We find and share evidence-based practices to improve Americans’ health and well-being, including services that can prevent suicide, improve mental health care, and treat substance use disorder.

We also have a long-standing commitment to encouraging early-career scientists who are pursuing innovative approaches to lifesaving biomedical research.

Featured

The New Frontiers of Medical Innovation Are Already Here

A few decades ago, innovation in medicine used to mean a new pill, a new machine, or a new surgical technique. Today, it means a generative artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot that helps to prevent depression, a smartwatch that catches atrial fibrillation to save lives, or a genetic test so easy to use that it can be taken in the privacy of a patient’s home. What we call “medical innovation” has undergone radical changes, and with that comes new challenges: Policies, regulations, guidelines, and, even more importantly, our culture and understanding must change with it so that we can enjoy the benefits of the future of health care.

Trend Magazine

From Medical Scans to AI Answers in Seconds

Modern medicine can image a perforation in your intestine with millimeter precision. But getting someone to tell you it’s there? That takes hours. Sometimes until morning.

Trend Magazine

An App That Is Transforming Vision Tests

It was the beginning of a long, difficult day in July 2012. I had left my home in Kenya before the sun rose that morning. My team and I had traveled for hours along dark, dusty roads until they gave out, and we rumbled across fields to reach the small village where we were setting up a temporary eye clinic.

Trend Magazine

How Targeted Therapy Is Changing Cancer Treatment

This year, more than 2 million Americans will hear the words "you have cancer." That's 5,500 people each day—about one every 15 seconds. And as upsetting as that phrase might be, even more distressing is the word that often comes next: chemotherapy.

Trend Magazine

State Policy Approaches to Expand Naloxone Access

Every year since 2021, more than 100,000 people in the U.S. have died from a drug overdose, primarily involving opioids such as fentanyl. And fentanyl has increasingly been found in other drugs, including methamphetamine and cocaine, which has contributed to these overdose deaths.

Fact of the Matter

49,449
AMERICANS
die by suicide in 2022.
18%
OF AMERICANS
with opioid use disorders received any medication to treat them in 2023.
30%
INCREASE IN SUICIDE RATE
in the U.S. from 2000 to 2020.
178,000
DEATHS EACH YEAR
from frequent or excessive drinking.

Latest

Our Work

Professional psychologist doctor listening and giving the consult to female patients

Good health is important to everyone. Pew conducts research and provides information and fact-based recommendations to state agencies, hospitals, researchers, and other health partners to help them provide better care. We find and share evidence-based practices to improve Americans’ health and well-being, including services that can prevent suicide, improve mental health care, and treat substance use disorder.

Bustleton Free Library in Philadelphia, PA, on Thursday September 12 2024.

Communities throughout the country share common needs: affordable connections to broadband Internet, modern and reliable energy infrastructure, effective responses to mental health challenges, and ways to resolve legal disputes more quickly and fairly. To address these issues, Pew collaborates with states and local governments to find and promote evidence-based solutions that help provide stability and opportunity.

High angle helicopter shot of the Capitol Building in Washington, D.C. at twilight on a clear evening in Fall, with Pennsylvania Avenue beyond.

Nonpartisan, fact-based improvements in federal policy can create jobs, lower costs, and help the nation prepare for the future. When our research shows that small changes can have a big impact, we work across party lines to improve national challenges like housing affordability, internet access, energy reliability, and health care.

Sunshine

Economic opportunity is the foundation of American society. Pew supports national, state, and local efforts to expand opportunity and promote financial well-being. Our work helps people pay off student loans, navigate court proceedings such as debt collection, buy or rent a home, access affordable internet, and save for their retirement.

Turkish world record-holder free-diver and divers of the Underwater Federation Sahika Encumen dives amid plastic waste in Ortakoy coastline to observe the life and pollution of Bosphorus in Istanbul,

The global ocean teems with life, and it contributes to the vital cycles that keep people and our planet healthy. But the seas are vulnerable to overfishing, loss of habitat such as seagrasses and mangroves, ineffective fisheries management, plastic pollution, and declining biodiversity. These mounting losses affect the coastal communities that depend on the ocean for food and jobs.

The House Chamber at the Kentucky State Capitol is shown as the legislature tries to wrap up its session

States and cities are the “laboratories of democracy” in America—the places where lawmakers and governors look for new ways to help their communities succeed. Whether in Pew’s hometown of Philadelphia or any of the 50 state capitals, we help elected leaders respond to the needs of their citizens, use public dollars wisely, fix outdated policies, and build a better future for all.

A view of steep cliff, grand canyon and Colorado river from Toroweap overlook.

Conserving natural spaces conveys benefits far beyond the gains to wildlife and their habitats. As scores of studies show, protecting and restoring lands and waters, particularly when done in close partnership with local communities, also improves people’s lives—and local economies—by increasing tourism and outdoor recreation.