In responding to at least two of your classmates, do you agree or disagree with their conclusions on how economic principles should be balanced in healthcare decision making? Are the

Alex Discussion:

Hi everyone! I hope everyone had a fun holiday yesterday. 

My name is Alex. I've been an English teacher for the past 10 years and am making the shift to public health/epidemiology. My husband and I have been together for a long time and have two daughters, ages 4 and 6. Working full time plus grad school full time plus momming full time means I have basically zero free time, but what time I do have I spend writing, reading, or binge-watching shows (I'm working on Scandal at the moment). I am hoping to gain more knowledge about the economics of healthcare from this course. My mom was a healthcare industry lobbyist for a long time, so I know a bit, but it is a vast field.

The positives of applying the economic principles we learned about to healthcare include healthcare innovation and consumer choice options. When healthcare companies or organizations compete with each other to offer better healthcare ("better" meaning higher quality, lower cost, etc.), then innovation is likely to happen in order to make more consumers choose their product – think of the "competition" for the COVID vaccines. Consumers also like to have choice, so when there are choice options for them regarding healthcare, it can also lead to better healthcare as providers aim to provide better care for lower consumer costs (of course, health insurance muddies that relationship between consumer and provider, as noted in Professor Gruber's MIT video) (2020). Negatives include inequity in healthcare, both in terms of access and affordability, and consumer neglect in favor of profit margins. When we apply a supply and demand model to healthcare, by default, there will be haves and have-nots, even if the have-nots desire to have healthcare (as is the case right now). This also extends to things like pharmaceuticals, specialized treatment, and postcare.  Though any reasonable person would say life is priceless, insurance companies have to put a monetary value on life for their industry to even make sense. Healthcare organizations must balance trade-offs, costs of care vs. what the patient can afford, costs vs. benefits, and incentivizing people to use a system that is different from what they already do or use (Henderson, 2017). It is a delicate balancing act all on its own without even touching the political implications of something like single-payer or even a state-vs-federal healthcare system. Overall, though I don't like it or agree with it wholly, our current system is working as best as it can without global systemic change.

Have a good week everyone!

Alex

References

Henderson, J. W. (2017). Health Economics and Policy (7th ed.). Cengage Learning US.  https://mbsdirect.vitalsource.com/books/9781337668279

Massachusetts Institute of Technology. (2020). 25. Health Economics. YouTube. Retrieved July 5, 2023, from  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jsiCft5v2dk.

Navi Discussion:

Hi everyone, my name is Navi. During my free time I like to garden, spend time with my family and dogs, as well as create digital art! I come from a healthcare background consisting of Kinesiology, Athletic Care and aim to finish my Master’s in Healthcare Administration that I can apply to my future career as a healthcare executive. My goal is to fine tune and polish my knowledge for this class so I can understand the impact of economics in relation to health care issues. One of the most important topics I am eager to dive into is how public policy in health and medical care are analyzed from an economic perspective.  

Basic economic principles in the healthcare industry can bring a variety of positive and negative impacts. Some principles can increase the efficiency of how well resources are allocated, but this comes with maintain a delicate balance especially when it comes to ethical considerations within healthcare. Some positive effects that come with applying these economic principles within healthcare may consist of cost containment: optimization of health care delivery and determining cost-effective treatments. This can contribute to the overall reduction of healthcare cost burden. Some negative impacts may consist of: unequal access to healthcare (a problem the U.S constantly is affected with), economic principles in healthcare can sometimes limit the access to necessary treatments and services for patients outside of a certain financial bracket. This can exacerbate social and economic inequalities which leads to a much larger issue. This can also raise ethical dilemmas along the lines of disregard for value of human life and instead prioritizing cost-efficiency. 

Balance is a crucial element in the combination healthcare and economic principles. In order to do this successfully, an organization must ensure they are involving healthcare professionals, patients as well as the overall community to ensure that decisions are made with a more holistic consideration. It is also important to utilize evidence-based decision making so that decisions are backed by research so that we are still involving economic efficiency with ethical obligations. When talking about assigning monetary value to life, we need to keep in mind that it’s a complex and controversial subject. From an ethical point of view, it’s a huge challenge to subject something as big as human life to a financial measure. Although economic analysis (VSL) might be able to provide an estimate for statistics regarding life to help guide decisions, we cannot rely on it entirely to capture the essence of actual human life. (Keller et Al., 2021). 

 Reference: 

Keller, E., Newman, J. E., Ortmann, A., Jorm, L. R., & Chambers, G. M. (2021). How Much Is a Human Life Worth? A Systematic Review.  Value in health : the journal of the International Society for Pharmacoeconomics and Outcomes Research,  24(10), 1531–1541.

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