We review in considerable detail the conceptual and measurement issues that underlie construction of medical care price indexes in the US, focusing in particular on the medical care consumer price indexes (MCPIs) and medical-related producer price indexes (MPPIs). We outline salient features of...

This paper is concerned with the economics of mental health. We argue that mental health economics is like health economics only more so: uncertainty and variation in treatments are greater; the assumption of patient self-interested behavior is more dubious; response to financial incentives such...

An important consideration when establishing priorities in health care is the likely effect that alternative allocations will have on the health-related quality of life (HRQoL) of the relevant population. This chapter considers some of the important issues surrounding the description and...

Equity in health has to be distinguished from equity in access to health care, or equity in the distribution of health care resources. We take as a working definition of health for our purposes the number of quality adjusted life years that a person may expect to enjoy over his or her lifetime....

Prevention ranges from medical decisions such as vaccinations and clinical preventive services delivered during periodic health examinations to private health lifestyle decisions such as regular exercise and non-smoking. The aim of this chapter is to provide an overview of economic issues that...