We review in considerable detail the conceptual and measurement issues that underlie construction of medical care price indexes in the U.S., particularly the medical care consumer price indexes (MCPIs) and medical-related producer price indexes (MPPIs). We outline salient features of the medical...

Although broad trends in medical spending in the U.S. over the last decade have received widespread attention from policymakers, very little attention has focused on the components of those changes. For many other industries, economists typically divide nominal expenditures by an official...

We construct price indexes for treatment of a specific illness, acute phase major depression, using treatment episodes of care (rather than fixed input bundles) to define quantity. We identify different treatment service bundles that combine varying quantities of prescription drugs, medical...

Using insurance claims data from nine large self-insured employers offering 26 alternative health benefit plans, we examine empirically how the composition and utilization for the treatment of depression vary under alternative organizational forms of insurance (indemnity, preferred provider...

Background: Previous research has shown that a manufacturer's promotional strategy for a brand name drug is typically affected by generic entry. However, little is known about how newer strategies to extend patent life, including product reformulation introduction or obtaining approval to market...

We review in considerable detail the conceptual and measurement issues that underlie construction of medical care price indexes in the US, focusing in particular on the medical care consumer price indexes (MCPIs) and medical-related producer price indexes (MPPIs). We outline salient features of...

"The advent of novel psychotropic medications has revolutionized treatments for mental illnesses over the past few decades. Concurrently, changes in mental health coverage, particularly for Medicaid patients, created economic incentives for insurance carriers to shift costs and to encourage the...