Diabetes is a chronic medical condition that can lead to serious complications, including blindness, lower-limb amputations, cardiovascular disease, and kidney disease. Since the 1950s, rates of diabetes have increased significantly across the country. This brief summarizes a study commissioned...

Applied research aims to provide answers to "real world" questions. Whether that research is used in the real world to encourage innovation and change, however, has typically not been a major research focus. The U.S. Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality’s Integrated Delivery Systems...

This article analyzes potential barriers in the U.S. to the patient-centered medical home model, which is considered policy shorthand for the reinvention of primary care. Barriers include developing new payment models, personnel and infrastructure funding, and methods to facilitate transforming...

There is broad consensus that family structure is inextricably linked with poverty and the well-being of children. This paper reviews the connections between poverty, family structure, and child well-being; explains the rationale for a new policy strategy focused on intervening more directly at...

Congestive heart failure (CHF)—the inability of the heart to pump enough blood to the body—is the leading cause of hospitalizations among Medicare beneficiaries. Despite the fact that this is a chronic disease for which appropriate outpatient care can reduce hospitalizations, the...

State Medicaid and SCHIP agencies provide vital health coverage to low-income populations and other groups, but they have limited administrative resources to support enrollment and renewal. This brief looks at experiences of some state Medicaid and SCHIP agencies in using a process change model...