Bouthevillain and Hervé examine the policy problems posed by the expansion of health expenditure in France and in other developed countries. They provide a concise overview of the main features of the different health-care systems and consider some aspects of insurance theory that apply to...

Background: Patients' failure to take medication as prescribed – poor medication adherence – is a well-known issue. Health information technology (IT) presents itself as a promising approach to tackle poor medication adherence.Objectives: To deepen the understanding of what features health...

To date, there exists no thermometer to measure vacillations in a person's mental health, which is a good thing for febriphobics, and generally speaking, neither acetaminophen nor ibuprofen can cure mental illness, especially if the diagnosis is pharmacophobia. Unlike a fractured bone or sinus...

So-called “public programs” in U.S. health care pervasively contract with private entities. The contracting does not merely involve the purchase of drugs, devices, information technology, insurance, and medical care. Rather, government agencies are increasingly outsourcing decisions about...

The term, “American exceptionalism” coined by the French historian Alexis de Tocqueville during a trip to the still young United States in 1835, refers to the idea that the US is different from other developed nations because of its unique origins, evolution, and institutions. Briefly stated...

America's health care policy debate has long been framed as Left versus Right, Democrat versus Republican, federal versus state, and public versus private. This paper offers an alternative demarcation: Fortress versus Frontier. Health care is mostly in the Fortress, meaning that public policy...

This paper discusses the relationship between medical innovations and ageing from a health economics perspective and surveys empirical evidence on medical R&D incentives, R&D costs of pharmaceuticals, and the cost-effectiveness of health innovations. Particular focus is on the endogeneity of...