Health-care systems that rely on hospitalization for early patient treatment pose a financial concern for governments. In this article, the author suggests a hospitalization prevention program in which the decision of whether to intervene on a patient depends on a simple decision model and the...

Two recent changes in health policy will likely negatively impact state budgets and the health of low-income Californians with chronic disease. The new cost-sharing for medical visits, pharmaceuticals, and inpatient stays in California’s Medcaid program (Medi-Cal) and the exclusion of the...

On March 23, 2010, President Barack Obama signed the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) into law. The law, which includes provisions to rein in the cost of health care and improve the health delivery system, will be phased in over several years. In the interim, this signature...

Americans’ health insurance coverage is not static; people cycle in and out of coverageand between sources of coverage during life transitions like losing a job, changing jobs, moving, or divorce. The Affordable Care Act creates an unprecedented opportunity to address the gaps in health coverage...

With falling prices of antiretroviral drugs in countries like India, there has been an increasing awareness that antiretroviral therapy can be made available and accessible to a large number of HIV-positive individuals. Prices, however, still remain high enough to keep ART out of reach of a...

Purpose – This article aims to provide a description of principal aspects of policy and practice associated with orphan drugs and treatments of rare diseases, and give perspectives for 2011 on new and emerging approaches for addressing patient access. Design/methodology/approach –...

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to investigate the effects of different information sources on consumer health behavior during pandemics. Design/methodology/approach – We collected survey data from 321 adults in a large western US city during November 2009 by mall and street...

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to explore the relationship between the ratification of the United Nations’ (UN’s) Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) and women’s and girls’ health outcomes using a unique longitudinal data set of...

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to explore the interdependence between donor countries’ health aid expenditures. The specific form of interdependence considered is the leader effect, whereby an influential country has a positive leverage effect on other donor countries’ aid...