Unbiased Analysis of Today's Healthcare Issues
Why do HMO patients receive less care than fee-for-service patients? Could it be that HMO patients are healthier (adverse selection) or that FFS compensation leads to increased demand for medical services (moral hazard)? A paper by Shen, et al. (2004) finds that one reason could be that physician compensation could affect a doctor’s desire to perform…
People love their doctors. Study after study has shown this to be true. Typically 75%-95% of patients surveyed claim that they completely or mostly trust their physician. Does this finding hold even when doctors are compensated through a capitation method and have a financial incentive to withhold care? A study by Kao, et al. (1998) shows…
While I was reading the The New York Times Magazine, I came across a very interesting article regarding scientific integrity. The article (“An unwelcome discovery“) documents how a Eric Poehlman, a faculty member at the University of Vermont, had fabricated ten years worth of data. This is a serious problem . Sally Jean Rockey of the…
Are you feeling ill or experiencing worrying symptoms? Interested in looking for information regarding a disease? If so, you can find answers to these and other medical questions at Wrong Diagnosis. This site uses reliable sources to create it medical database. These sources include: the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the National Institute…
Media that Matters is an organization dedicated to producing films portraying controversial issues relevant to today’s society and encouraging viewers to work towards social change. While the organization is heavily left leaning politically, they do have a wide variety of health-related films (see health/health advocacy section). I did come across an interesting short film regarding…
What is one to do when the dependent variable under investigation is categorical? Well if these categories are ordered, then an ordered probit (or logit) estimation technique is a sensible means for estimation. An example where ordered probit estimation should be used is for an integer index ranking of physician quality between one and five. On…
The University of California San Diego (UCSD) is where I currently attend graduate school. The UCSD Medical Center has been in some hot water lately. The Office of the Inspector General (OIG) of the Department of Health and Human Services has alleged that UCSD has overcharged Medicare $48 million for pension costs. According to a UCSD Guardian…
As insurance markets began to develop in the U.S., we observed two types of insurance emerging: indemnity plans and health maintenance organizations (HMOs). Indemnity plans compensated providers on a fee-for-service basis and HMOs used a capitation scheme. Typically, HMOs used gatekeepers to restrict services while indemnity plan restrictions were few and far between. Typical analysis…
The dealings of William McGuire, CEO of UnitedHealth Group, have been topic occasionally touched on by the Healthcare Economist (see May 19th and February 14th posts). Today, Yahoo! News reported that Mr. McGuire will step down as chairman and CEO after questions arose regarding Mr. McGuire’s possibly illicit stock option compensation. More from the Yahoo!…
Muhammad Yunus, founder of the Grameen Bank, won the Nobel Peace prize today (New York Times – “Microloan Pioneer“). I report on Mr. Yunus in an earlier blog post (“Father of Microcredit“). If you are interested in contributing to a microcredit organization, the following organizations are two good choices. Grameen Bank: Microcredit pioneer focusing mostly…