All primary care doctors in Denmark use electronic medical records and 98 percent have the ability to electronically manage patient care—including ordering prescriptions, drafting notes about patient visits, and sending appointment reminders. In addition, almost all medical communication between primary care doctors, specialists, and hospitals is electroni […]

Denmark is one of the world's leading countries in the use of health care technology. Virtually all Danish primary care physicians have electronic medical records with full clinical functionality.

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.

Are there enough votes in the House to pass the Senate's health-care bill?

As Speaker Nancy Pelosi and her lieutenants cajole, entreat and threaten House Democrats to approve the Senate health-care bill, they argue that any problem with it can be fixed before it becomes law.

"Primum nil nocere."

President Barack Obama is pushing Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid to go further than Obama has previously disclosed to strip the final health care reform bill of the narrow deals aimed at appeasing specific senators.

There are legislative miles to go before the government will be emancipated from its health-care myopia, but it is not too soon for a summing-up.

Medicis has started a new marketing campaign that pits its wrinkle-smoother, Dysport, directly against Botox. It makes bioethicists squirm.

Rank-and-file House Democrats were frustrated, saying they had received few details about what would be in the legislation.

The president said he would unleash auditors in a crackdown on Medicare and Medicaid waste and fraud, a move to please both liberals and conservatives.

The state legislature approved a measure that bucks any effort by President Obama and Congress to carry out a national health care overhaul in individual states.

As Democrats considered potential maneuvers, business groups announced plans for a campaign to stop the legislation.

Me Minus 10 got off to a rocky start two weeks ago: No sooner had I pledged to lose 10 pounds than I got, first, a GI-tract malady and then a wicked head cold (both now resolved). Neither helped me mentally or physically. Nor did learning, upon purchase of a new scale, that I have 12, not 10 poun...

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.

The emergency department is always noisy, but sudden screams from a staffer still get attention. The triage nurse is yelling, "Not breathing, had vitals at triage and just croaked," as she runs toward us pushing a wheelchair. In it, a pale, thin man is slumped over and looking gray. I'm the atten...

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."

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.

State regulators today said that they will likely overhaul the complex formula they use to determine how many Massachusetts residents face a tax penalty for not having health insurance because spiraling costs are making coverage unaffordable for too many people.The...

In just two years, spending on MRIs, mammograms, and other imaging tests climbed by at least $214 million in Massachusetts, helping to fuel a dramatic rise in the cost of outpatient hospital care.A bill that would ban the sale of...

By Carolyn Y. Johnson, Globe Staff Eric S. Lander, founding director of the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, is one of three winners of the Albany Medical Center Prize in Biomedical Research, a $500,000 prize awarded this year for...

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...

Those cards you swipe at grocery stores — sure, they'll shave some money off your bill and give stores all kinds of info about your food and personal-toiletry preferences — well, now they're a public health tool. With shoppers' permission,...

Remember those studies showing that Baby Einstein DVDs are more likely to turn Junior into a Baby Homer Simpson? You know, the studies that helped the Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood persuade Walt Disney Co. to offer full refunds to...

"Recognizing National Public Health Week will serve as an important reminder for individuals, families and communities to focus on stopping preventable diseases before they start,” says Sen. Tom Udall (D-N.M.). “National Public Health Week offers a reminder to all of...

Democratic proposals to cut Medicare spending are good policy, said New Hampshire Senator Judd Gregg, the senior Republican on the Senate Budget Committee, at a Health Affairs Media Breakfast this morning. The problem, according to Gregg, is that Democrats want to use the money saved to fund new benefits under health reform legislation, rather than [...]

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 […]