https://www.thelancet.com/pdfs/journals/lancet/PIIS0140-6736(08)61690-6.pdf

Closing the gap in a generation: health equity through action on the social determinants of health

The author systematically examines one of the important issues of information — establishing the market price. He introduces the concept of «search» — where a buyer wanting to get a better price, is forced to question sellers. The article deals with various aspects of finding the necessary information.

Economics of Information

https://www.thelancet.com/pdfs/journals/lancet/PIIS0140-6736(03)13861-5.pdf

Household catastrophic health expenditure: a multicountry analysis.

正しい方法がわかる臨床基本手技 : from the New England journal of medicine

Over the past decade interest in the economic evaluation of health care interventions has risen1 Reviews of published studies have, however, shown gaps in the quality of work2 3 4 5 As far back as 1974 Williams listed the essential elements of economic evaluations,6 and more recently Drummond and colleagues set out the methodological areas generally agreed among economists7 Guidelines for economic evaluations have been promulgated and reviewed by many bodies,8 9 10 11 12 13 14 but few medical journals have explicit guidelines for peer review of economic evaluations or consistently use economist reviewers for economic papers even though they are a major publication outlet for economic evaluations15 16 17 In January 1995 the BMJ set up a working party on economic evaluation to improve the quality of submitted and published economic articles

It was not our intention to be unduly prescriptive or stifle innovative methods; our emphasis is on improving the clarity of economic evaluations We also did not address those issues of conduct that have been emphasised in other guidelines13 14 15 16 17 18

The working party's objectives were to improve the quality of submitted and published economic evaluations by agreeing acceptable methods and their systematic application before, during, and after peer review Its task was to produce: (a) guidelines for economic evaluation, together with a comprehensive supporting statement which could be easily understood by both specialist and non-specialist readers; (b) a checklist for use by referees and authors; and (c) a checklist for use by editors

In producing the guidelines the working party has concentrated on full economic evaluations comparing two or more health care interventions and considering both costs and consequences19 Articles sent to the BMJ and other medical journals are often more broadly based “economic …

/pdf/guidelines-for-authors-and-peer-reviewers-of-economic-uz9mnnz1jd.pdf

Guidelines for authors and peer reviewers of economic submissions to the BMJ. The BMJ Economic Evaluation Working Party.

Provider payments and cost-containment lessons from OECD countries

African trypanosomiasis, or sleeping sickness, is a tropical disease caused by trypanosome parasites transmitted by tsetse flies. The focus of this paper is on the cost-effectiveness of alternative drug treatments for patients in the late stage of the disease. Melarsoprol has been used for many decades. More recently, eflornithine has been developed. It has fewer side effects and improves the overall cure rate. It is much more expensive than melarsoprol, however. The objective of the present cost-effectiveness is to identify the costs and benefits that would be involved in switching from melarsoprol to eflornithine in the treatment of late stage sleeping sickness. Benefits are expressed in lives saved as well as in disability adjusted life years (DALYs). The analysis is applied to the case of Uganda. The implications for affordability are also considered, by taking account of how the treatment costs would be shared between the national government, donors and patients. The baseline results indicate that melarsoprol treatment is associated with an incremental cost per life and DALY saved of $209 and $8, respectively. Each additional life saved by switching from melarsoprol alone to a combination of melarsoprol and eflornithine would cost an extra $1,033 per life saved, and an extra $40.9 per DALY gained. Shifting from this second alternative to treatment of all patients with eflornithine leads to an incremental cost per life saved of $4,444 and an incremental cost of $166.8 per DALY gained.

Cost-effectiveness analysis of alternative treatments of African gambiense trypanosomiasis in Uganda.

‘Health for all by the year 2000’ is unlikely to be achieved in a number of Third World countries, including those in Sub-Saharan Africa, if reliance is placed solely on the public health budget. This article looks at a range of alternative and additional sources of revenue and, in particular, at the scope for community financing of drugs. Developments in the region are reviewed for their insights into the strengths and weaknesses of each financing scheme; and, as a guide to shaping policies that make an appropriate choice of method of health care financing.

Community financing of drugs in Sub-Saharan Africa.

The paper presents an empirical model of the demand of health care in Belgium. The analysis pertains to 17 categories of medical care and to two subgroups of health insurance beneficiaries, namely the ‘active’ and the ‘widows, orphans, pensioners and invalids’. The estimation results show that income and relative prices matter in the demand for medical care. Supplier induced demand is also detected for a number of medical care categories. Other explanatory variables in the model include the size of the child population, climatic conditions and a time trend, representing technological advances in health care.

Guy Carrin

Papers

Provider payments and cost-containment lessons from OECD countries

Cost-effectiveness analysis of alternative treatments of African gambiense trypanosomiasis in Uganda.

Community financing of drugs in Sub-Saharan Africa.

An empirical model of the demand for health care in Belgium

Conditional cash transfers: what's in it for health?