HEALTH ECONOMICS 4/5/17

Question 1

What is economics?

Answer 1

the study of choices made by individuals and societies in terms of alternative uses of resources which are employed to satisfied wants

Question 2

What are the 3 key concepts in economics?

Answer 2

1. opportunity cost
2. efficiency
3. marginal analysis

Question 3

What is opportunity cost?

Answer 3

• the value of something when a particular course of action is chosen
  e. g. opportunity cost of taking a holiday this year instead of replacing your car
• should aim to minimise

Question 4

what are quality adjusted life years (QALYS)?

Answer 4

• a measure of the output of health care that can measure all types of health effect
• different from health related quality of life
• include preferences that allow value of the health condition of interest

Question 5

What is economic evaluation?

Answer 5

a comparison of two or more alternative courses of action in terms of their cost and their outcomes

Question 6

When do we use economic evaluation? (2)

Answer 6

• to ensure the value of the outputs from an activity is greater than the value of the resources consumed by the activity
• to provide information about how much it costs per unit of health gain to choose one course of action over another

Question 7

What is efficiency?

Answer 7

maximising the benefit for the resources used

Question 8

how is economic efficiency achieved?

Answer 8

when resources are allocated between activities in such a way as to maximise benefit

Question 9

What is technical efficiency?

Answer 9

how best to meet a given objective

e.g. organising patient follow up clinics via virtual clinics to maximise numbers seen

Question 10

what is allocative efficiency?

Answer 10

is an activity worthwhile

• is a follow up necessary, who needs it?

Question 11

What is marginal analysis?

Answer 11

involves comparing the benefit from that next step which is called Marginal benefit with the cost of taking the next step which is called marginal cost

Question 12

What does the three types of economic evaluation most frequently used depend on?

Answer 12

the outcome/s of interest

Question 13

When do you do a cost effectiveness analysis?

Answer 13

when we want to compare alternatives with in a condition

e.g. changes in blood pressure

Question 14

What do we use to compare across conditions? (3)

Answer 14

1. cost effectiveness analysis
2. cost utility analysis
3. cost benefit analysis

Question 15

What does cost effectiveness analysis calculate?

Answer 15

the (expected) cost per additional unit of health produced by a new intervention compared to current practice

= also called incremental cost effectiveness ratio (ICER)

Question 16

What is the cost-effectiveness threshold?

Answer 16

the maximum amount the health service will pay per unit of health gained

Question 17

What is option appraisal?

Answer 17

a structured process for identifying,d escrowing and evaluating alternative methods of achieving an agreed objective

• the first step is to identify the objective

Question 18

What are the key steps in option appraisal? (7)

Answer 18

1. define objective and constraints
2. identify and describe the options
3. identify and quantify monetary costs and benefits of each option
4. assess risks for each option
5. identify and quantify non-monetary costs and benefits of each option
6. weigh non-monetary costs and benefits of each option
7. assess balance of advantage between options

Question 19

What constraints are there in the research project?

Answer 19

time, budget, skill level and legal

Question 20

How do you identify and describe options?

Answer 20

1. what to provide?
2. where to provide it?
3. who provides it?
4. how is it provided?

Question 21

What are examples of non-monetary costs and benefits?

Answer 21

1. QOL
2. access
3. health outcomes
4. quality of care indicators
5. patient safety
6. patient preferance
7. adherance, compliance
8. staff experience