Charles D. Scales
Papers
4
Total Citations
494
H-Index
3
About
Charles D. Scales is a leading health services researcher and urologic surgeon whose work has fundamentally shaped our understanding of the economics of surgical innovation. His primary research areas center on the comparative effectiveness, cost analysis, and value-based assessment of urologic procedures, with a particular focus on robotic surgery. Scales’s landmark studies, including his highly cited 2010 work on hysterectomy costs for endometrial cancer (180 citations) and his pivotal 2005 analysis of robot-assisted radical prostatectomy (160 citations), demonstrated that the adoption of robotic technology is highly sensitive to local cost structures and hospital volume. By using sophisticated decision modeling and sensitivity analyses, he revealed that the economic viability of robotic surgery is not uniform, challenging the assumption that newer technology is universally superior or cost-effective. His work has provided critical evidence for policymakers, hospital administrators, and surgeons navigating the adoption of expensive surgical platforms. More recently, Scales has continued to advance the field by comparing costs and outcomes for benign prostatic hyperplasia treatments, such as simple prostatectomy versus laser enucleation. Through his rigorous, data-driven approach, Scales has become an essential voice in the ongoing debate over how to balance surgical innovation with fiscal responsibility in healthcare.
Research Focus
Key Achievements
Top Papers
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- 2LOCAL COST STRUCTURES AND THE ECONOMICS OF ROBOT ASSISTED RADICAL PROSTATECTOMY160 citations · 2005
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