Economic Evaluations in Healthcare

The topic for this week was a necessary one.  After both presentations and discussions from Dr. Johnson were complete, I was left with a structured outline showing how to evaluate different variables in healthcare.  I was really trying to over-analyze the situations presented to us in the beginning because that is the way I have been trained.  I realized that the concepts should remain simple and logical throughout the process and should serve as the foundation of the evaluation.  It is only then that more details can be added to the complexity of the problem.  Overall, the process of analyzing an economic situation has few rules--to maintain a perspective, define your variables, and appropriately measure your outcome.  I think I have had the most trouble identifying the perspective in some situations where the perspective does not include individuals that I thought would be included (government, taxpayers, etc.).  I think that will probably just make me take a closer look at perspective in future readings.  The exercise given was an appropriate way to get us all thinking about the economics behind what we are studying. 

Posted by Annie