Factors influencing women who seek folk healers for care and who use herbal medicine are not well understood. The influence of social capital and cultural factors on utilisation behaviour of three ethnic groups – Kazakhs, Russians and Koreans – in Almaty, Kazakhstan, was...

A nationally representative sample of 12,280 physicians was selected to investigate physician practices in 60 randomly selected communities. Multivariate analyses demonstrate that the more the physicians accept Medicare managed care patients, private or commercial insurance plans including...

The importance of coordinated efforts between local, state and federal disaster responses and their inherent effects on regional and global emergency preparation is highlighted. By addressing disaster risk reduction and human development policy together, a best practice approach is identified. A...

Medical billing errors constitute a major problem in the medical payment system in the USA. Little is known about how to identify the predictors that influence the error rate in hospital billings. Health services researchers have concentrated to a large extent on applying exploratory statistical...

This paper states that traditional facilities (i.e., hospitals, remote physician offices or referral care) may not be the best choice for chronic diseases that require long-term care. The increased need for specialised managed care for the growing numbers in the USA who require such care...

Although the high percentage of the uninsured is an important public policy issue, discrepancies in both state and national estimates of the numbers of uninsured are reported. There is a critical need to address the methodological problem of the estimation. This study compares four advanced...

The application of health systems analysis points to the need to specify theoretically the circumstances under which health disparities exist in the USA as well as in other countries. This paper highlights the importance of developing major themes in global health research and formulating...

Organisations across the country are transforming the way they deliver care, in ways similar to the accountable care organisation (ACO) model supported by Medicare. ACOs modalities are varying in size, type, and financing structure. Little is known about how specific infrastructural mechanisms...

An integrated perspective consisting of macro- and micro-level approaches to health policy research and evaluation is presented. Analytical strategies are suggested for policy analysis, targeting on health disparities at individual and population levels. This systems approach enables...

This study assesses the impact of recent Medicare reimbursement changes on nurse staffing and quality of care in skilled nursing facilities. We utilise data from the Online Survey Certification and Reporting System and Area Resource Files for the years 1997â2003. The impacts of the...