This consensus report lays the groundwork for a measurement framework that evaluates efficiency, and ultimately value, across patient-focused episodes of care. This framework will help key stakeholders move toward a high-performing healthcare system that is patient-centered, focused on quality, mindful of costs, and vigilant against waste.

Massachusetts has successfully demonstrated the Massachusetts Child Psychiatry Access Project, a program that provides timely telephonic psychiatric and clinical guidance to primary care providers treating children with mental health problems. This study looks into the development and implementation of the project.

This article looks an experimental program in Milwaukee that uses trained parent mentors to help other parents care for their young child's asthma.

Medicare savings programs are designed to provide financial assistance to Medicare beneficiaries whose income and assets are too high to allow them to qualify for full Medicaid coverage. This article examines policy changes that would expand eligibility by either relaxing resource requirements or increasing the income limit.

A study of Medicare beneficiaries admitted to U.S. hospitals with congestive heart failure or pneumonia showed no definitive connection between the cost and quality of care, or between cost and death rates.

It’s taken Democrats a year to finalize their health care bill, so it should come as no surprise that they’re now fighting about the endgame — including an increasingly public spat about when a final push for passage should take place.

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) wants to revive the bipartisan Gang of 14 — this time for health care reform, not judicial nominees.

Some of the largest U.S. business groups announced a multimillion-dollar television advertising campaign aimed at defeating the Democrats' pending health-care legislation, as both backers and opponents of the initiative sought to target wavering lawmakers in what is expected to be the final phase of the legislative process.

As Republicans work to prevent a health-care bill from reaching President Obama, they are scrambling to exploit divisions between Democrats in the House and the Senate.

One of the more amazing aspects of the health-care debate is how steady public opinion has remained.

DePuy Orthopaedics alerted doctors to a high early failure rate of its artificial hip after announcing it would phase out the device citing slow sales.

President Obama’s health reform plan is a mixed bag, but it may be the only program passed.

In an appearance that harked back to his 2008 campaign, President Obama made an emotional pitch for public support.

Experts said state officials might be left to worry about the solvency of insurers, the ultimate consumer protection.

In his weekly radio address, the mayor stepped up his call for the Legislature to pass a penny-per-ounce tax on soda to stave off major service cuts to education and health care.

As Republicans work to prevent a health-care bill from reaching President Obama, they are scrambling to exploit divisions between Democrats in the House and the Senate.

When I was growing up, one of my mother's favorite admonitions -- along with "If you keep making that face, it's going to freeze that way" and "Don't sit too close to the television or you're going to need glasses" -- was the classic "Turn that music down, or you'll go deaf."

On a recent weekday morning, 15 expectant mothers are gathered in a circle in a large room at a Washington hospital for a collective third trimester checkup.

It seemed like a relatively simple process: When you get sick, first call your primary-care doctor. Second, visit said doctor. Third, follow doctor's orders: Fill prescriptions, take to bed, whatever. Fourth, get better.

Two things I've learned since launching my Me Minus 10 campaign to lose 10 pounds before I turn 50 in December: Many people want to lose 10 pounds -- and many would like to have cartoon images made of themselves! I've received tons of great feedback; here are some of your letters.

A group of Massachusetts mayors, fed up with what they say is legislative inaction on skyrocketing municipal health care costs, has launched a ballot initiative for 2012 aimed at giving cities and towns more flexibility in reducing expensive benefits for...

Comparing the effectiveness of different medical treatments, including their safety and their cost, is a cornerstone of health policy espoused by the Obama administration and funded by $1.1 billion in last year's economic stimulus package. Two Cambridge Health Alliance doctors...

Short White Coat is a blog about learning to be a doctor. Posts appear here as part of White Coat Notes. Ishani Ganguli is a fourth-year Harvard medical student. E-mail her at shortwhitecoat@gmail.com. Feedback: the ever-elusive Holy Grail in medical...

After 40 years, Phyl Rubin, half of the folksy furniture retail team of Bernie & Phyl, is going public about her fight with multiple sclerosis to raise awareness. Robert A. Weker, a longtime chemist and industrial hygienist at the Harvard...

Here's a new red-wine paradox: Women of normal weight who drank a moderate amount of alcohol -- especially red wine --� were less likely to gain weight than women who didn't drink at all, despite the calories in wine, beer,...

Medications called bisphosphonates are standard tools for the treatment of osteoporosis. They include Fosamax, Boniva, Actonel and Reclast. But new data released Wednesday raise some concern about whether the drugs are safe for long-term use. Although the medications help increase...

Kids go to school and share germs, they come home and share germs, they visit relatives and share germs... At no time is this special ability on better display than during influenza season. Logically enough, some public health experts (perhaps...

Nearly one in every two African American women ages 14 to 49 has genital herpes, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Tuesday. Overall, two out of every five blacks in that age group carry the virus, and one...

Editor’s Note: In addition to Peter Pronovost (photo and biography above), authors of this post include Julius Pham, Assistant Professor, Emergency Medicine, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine; Sara Singer, Assistant Professor, Harvard School of Public Health,  Department of Health Policy and Management, Massachusetts General Hospital; Jerod Loeb […]

In “Shock Me, Tube Me, Line Me,” a Narrative Matters essay in the February 2010 issue of Health Affairs, emergency physician Boris Veysman sets forth his own version of an advance directive and challenges common perceptions about care at the end of life. An excerpted version of Veysman’s essay appears in today’s Washington Post Health [...]

With apologies to Arthur Miller … President Obama went back before the cameras again Wednesday, providing yet another recycling of fading rationales for his health reform product that more voters would rather leave on the Capitol Hill store shelves than purchase.   But “attention must be paid” whenever the president speaks.  He tried to claim t […]

Posts on health reform dominate the ten most-read Health Affairs Blog posts for February. Also on the list are reports on health spending and an innovative way to supplement the primary care workforce: Health Reform: The Need To Move Forward by Henry Aaron Getting Health Reform Done by Timothy Jost The Grandparents Corps: A New Primary Care Model by Arthur […]

Over at his blog “Wright On Health,” Brad Wright presents some of the best in recent health policy blogging in the latest edition of the Health Wonk Review. Copyright � 2010 Health Affairs Blog. This Feed is for personal non-commercial use only. All material published on Health Affairs blog, excluding links, is covered under a Creative [...]