As health care costs rise, policymakers and industry leaders are increasingly interested in developing accurate ways to measure and, ultimately, to try to reduce them for the individual patient as well as for society as a whole. RAND researchers have sought to measure the health care costs of state and federal health plans, hospice treatment, and certain health behaviors.
REPORT
When enacting, implementing, and evaluating health care reform, policymakers should consider potential spillover effects on workers' compensation insurance. The experience of Massachusetts's heath care reform suggests that reform may reduce medical costs.
JOURNAL ARTICLE
Public reporting of health care costs is intended to motivate consumers to choose lower cost providers, and motivate providers to lower costs to retain market share. Measures should be chosen based on which pathway policymakers intend to influence.
JOURNAL ARTICLE
As health care reform expands the use of "report cards" to grade health care providers, greater attention to reporting methods may be needed to assure the quality of such efforts.
COMMENTARY
Providing physicians with cost data in real time automatically as a part of the electronic medical record could make them better purchasers for their patients and provide better value, writes Robert H. Brook.
JOURNAL ARTICLE
The technology of the ubiquitous electronic shopping cart could be adapted to help physicians understand the cost of the services they order for patients, and possibly change the mix and total costs of the products in the cart.
COMMENTARY
Most will agree with the undeniable fact that a new era in US medicine and US health care begins in less than 2 years. The key question is what potential measures should be monitored to determine both anticipated and unanticipated effects of the new law on the health of the US population, writes Robert H. Brook.
COMMENTARY
A scientific and political case could be made to amend health care legislation to require that cost be included in the studies that the PCORI funds, writes Robert H. Brook.
REPORT
Three essays each focusing on one topic in economics of health behaviors in China.
REPORT
Under Medicare, many health care services can be provided in a range of ambulatory settings, but payment differentials exist for the facility-related components of care. Building on prior RAND analyses, this report presents options for modifying Medicare payment policies to improve the value of services and to address cost and payment differentials for similar services provided in various ambulatory settings.
NEWS RELEASE
The historic RAND Health Insurance Experiment found that patients had little or no control over their health care spending once they began to receive a physician's care, but this has changed for those enrolled in consumer-directed health plans.
JOURNAL ARTICLE
The historic RAND Health Insurance Experiment found that patients had little or no control over their health care spending once they began to receive a physician's care, but this has changed for those enrolled in consumer-directed health plans.
NEWS RELEASE
Fast-rising health care costs have eaten nearly all the income gains made by a median-income American family of four over the past decade, leaving them with just $95 per month in extra income, after accounting for taxes and price increases.
RESEARCH BRIEF
Fast-rising health care costs have eaten nearly all the income gains made by a median-income American family of four over the past decade, leaving them with just $95 per month in extra income, after accounting for taxes and price increases.
JOURNAL ARTICLE
This article translates aggregate numbers about health spending into concrete measures that consumers can relate to.
RESEARCH BRIEF
Physician cost profiling is intended to identify physicians with lower spending patterns, but RAND analysts found that common profiling methods result in 22 percent of physicians being assigned to the wrong cost category in a two-tier system.
JOURNAL ARTICLE
Cost profiles of physician groups are statistically more reliable than profiles of individual physicians but they don't predict individual physician performance within the group.
RESEARCH BRIEF
Physician cost profiling is intended to identify physicians with lower spending patterns, but RAND analysts found that common profiling methods result in 22 percent of physicians being assigned to the wrong cost category in a two-tier system.
REPORT
To avoid changes in current health coverage, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act exempts existing plans from some regulations. These exemptions may lead to higher employer-sponsored insurance enrollment and lower government spending.
JOURNAL ARTICLE
Increasingly common insurance plans that encourage patients to receive care from physicians who keep medical costs lower are based on unreliable estimates of doctor performance and may not achieve the intended savings.
REPORT
This report reviews approaches to funding intensive care in systems that use activity-based payment based on diagnosis-related groups to reimburse hospital care (Victoria/Australia, Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Sweden, US-Medicare).
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