Unbiased Analysis of Today's Healthcare Issues
This year the Healthcare Economist, Jason Shafrin, will be completing his Ph.D. in health economics at the University of California, San Diego. He will be available for interviewing at the AEA meetings in San Francisco, January 3-5. For more information regarding Jason Shafrin’s credentials and his contact information, visit his homepage: jasonshafrin.com.
The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation awarded 25 individiuals with their 2008 “Genius” grants. Among these 25 individuals, two deal specifically with the field of medicine. Peter Provonost uses evidence-based medicine to standardize quality of care. To address the problem of catheter infections, “Pronovost culled lengthy guidelines into a simple checklist of five…
In the UK, a dental clinic has opened in a Sainsbury’s grocery store. The grocery store dental clinics aim to fill a patient need caused by the shortage of dentists in the UK. BBC News reports, “Dentist Lance Knight said the practice aimed at “making dental healthcare more accessible and convenient to better meet…
Robert Samuelson writes: “Economist Gary Burtless of the Brookings Institution recently discovered this astonishing data: on average, annual health spending per person — from all private and government sources — is equal for the poorest and the richest Americans. In 2003, it was $4,477 for the poorest fifth and $4,451 for the richest.” HT: Greg…
Continuing with yesterdays theme of fixing America’s fragmented health care system, I will review some of the Commonwealth Fund’s policy suggestions to improve health care quality. Expansion of P4P. While I support P4P in theory, in practice, it will be very difficult to apply. P4P rewards only measurable components of health care quality. Since much…
NPR’s Marketplace Money discusses the pros and cons of allowing Google Health to store your private medical records. [Dr. John Halamka, the Chief Information Officer at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center]: A patient can put privacy flags on any of this record that they wish. They can not change the facts in the record however.…
The U.S. healthcare system is one of the more fragmented systems in the world. Traditionally, economists believe that a splash of decentralized planning with a heap of free markets is a recipe for efficient outcomes. In the case of health care coordination, however, information sharing, and collaborative work are needed if quality is to improve…
According to the U.S. Census: Both the percentage and number of people without health insurance decreased in 2007. The percentage without health insurance was 15.3 percent in 2007, down from 15.8 percent in 2006, and the number of uninsured was 45.7 million, down from 47.0 million. The percentage of people covered by private health insurance…
Barack Obama and John McCain both believe that they know how to improve the American health care system. A policy brief by Michael Tanner has nice summary of the two candidates policies. I will review some of this paper today. Obama’s general health care policy Obama goal is to expand government provided health care and…
The BBC recently reported that a Durham University professor David Hunter is claiming that obesity is such a problem that its “…threat to our future health is just as significant as the current security threat.” What is Dr. Hunter’s solution? He said that bigger warning labels, changes in the taxation of “unhealthy” foods, and even…