Is the value of being healthy the same across all ages? The standard practice of economic evaluation assumes so, and does not discriminate between a QALY (Quality Adjusted Life Year) to an elderly person and one to a child. But on the other hand, it is possible to assume that the value of a...

The paper is first of all an up-to-date of the Central Policy Review Staff report on Alcohol Policies which reviewed the components of an integrated alcohol policy strategy (CPRS, 1979). That report identified sixteen Government departments with some interest in the production, distribution or...

There has been considerable interest in recent years in the major influences on self-perceived health status and health concerns (see Wright, 1985a, for a review). Two factors which might be anticipated to affect these variable are age and sex. The present study aims to examine the influence of...

Diabetes mellitus is a disease with major long-term implications, not only for the health and well-being of affected individuals, but also for costs to the National Health Service. Treatment of the disease and its complications takes up to 4-5% of total health care expenditure in the UK. These...

The development of performance indicators for the NHS has resulted in renewed interest in regression-based measures of hospital performance. This paper considers three regression-based measures of hospital efficiency, including the index of hospital ‘costliness’ proposed by Martin Feldstein...

General medical practice has changed significantly in the past ten years, reflecting a range of innovations giving greater priority to health prevention and promotion and to primary health care generally. One consequence has been a rapid increase in the number of practice nurses. Since 1988 the...

A review of relevant literature within health economics, psychology and moral philosophy suggests that people want resource allocation decisions in health to be informed by considerations of equity as well as efficiency. A number of empirical studies demonstrate that people are willing to...

In a budget constrained healthcare system the decision to invest in strategies to improve the implementation of cost-effective technologies must be made alongside decisions regarding investment in the technologies themselves and investment in further research. This paper presents a single,...

The optical services market has been altered substantially by government legislation over the past six years. Further deregulation has been proposed which would alter the content and structure of the eye test, resulting in a two-tier test. This would split the refractive sight test, aimed at...

This paper reviews studies providing evidence of the cost-effectiveness of safe motherhood interventions in low-income countries. The economic case for investing in safe motherhood interventions is also examined. It is estimated that 1,600 women die globally each day as a result of problems...