Background: Osteoporosis is considered a disease that affects elderly women. Younger, working-aged women are seldom considered to be at risk, although low bone mass may occur at menopause or even earlier. Bone density testing for working women may therefore be considered of low priority for both...

Objective: To identify patterns of care and associated costs for typical patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) in a US managed-care setting. Design: Retrospective analysis of administrative data from a proprietary managed-care research database. Patients: 6371 patients with...

Disease management has become an increasingly popular tool used to manage people with chronic diseases in managed care organizations. The implementation of these programs, coupled with pressures to document quality and control costs, has increased the need for information regarding the health...

Objective: To identify common features of primary care clinics that have successfully achieved improvement in chronic disease care. Methods: We analyzed seven primary care practices that have achieved significant improvement in chronic disease care provided to adults with diabetes mellitus,...

This article describes the critical ingredients of the assertive community treatment (ACT) model for people with severe mental illness and then reviews the evidence regarding its effectiveness and cost effectiveness. ACT is an intensive mental health program model in which a multidisciplinary...

Background: Osteoporosis is an exceedingly common, morbid, and potentially fatal disease. Efforts to improve the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of osteoporosis in people living in Central Pennsylvania were instituted in 1996 by the Geisinger Health System. With a catchment of over 2 million...

End-stage renal disease (ESRD) is relatively rare, but very costly. The ESRD population in the US is elderly, over 40% have diabetes mellitus, and most have additional comorbid conditions. Concerns about the quality and cost of care for people with ESRD in the US prompted the Healthcare...