Health economics / Charles E. Phelps.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Cover; Half Title; Title; Copyright; Dedication; CONTENTS; Preface; CHAPTER 1 Why Health Economics?; Important (If Not Unique) Aspects of Health Care Economics; How Markets Interrelate in Medical Care and Health Insurance; Afterthought; Summary; Related Chapters in Handbook of Health Economics; Problems; CHAPTER 2 Utility and Health; How to Think About Health and Health Care (or ... How Health Economics?); The Production of Health; Health Through the Lifecycle; A Model of Consumption and Health; Summary; Related Chapter in Handbook of Health Economics; Problems. Appendix to Chapter 2: A Formal Model of Utility MaximizationCHAPTER 3 The Transformation of Medical Care to Health; The Productivity of Medical Care; Confusion About the Production Function: A Policy Dilemma; Physician-Specific Variations (Medical Practice Styles); Extensive and Intensive Margin Differences: Are They Similar?; Summary; Related Chapters in Handbook of Health Economics; Problems; Appendix to Chapter 3: Marginal, Average, and Total Productivity; CHAPTER 4 The Demand for Medical Care: Conceptual Framework; Indifference Curves for Health and Other Goods. From Indifference Curves to Demand CurvesHow Demand Curves Depend on Illness Events; Demand Curves for Many Medical Services; The Demand Curve for a Society: Adding Up Individual Demands; Use of the Demand Curve to Measure Value of Care; How Insurance Affects a Demand Curve for Medical Care; Time Costs and Travel Costs; The Role of Quality in the Demand for Care; Revisited: The Price Index for Health Care; Summary; Related Chapters in Handbook of Health Economics; Problems; Appendix to Chapter 4: Demand Curves and Demand Elasticities. CHAPTER 5 Empirical Studies of Medical Care Demand and ApplicationsStudies of Demand Curves; Effects of Age and Gender on Demand; The Effects of Illness on Demand; Lifestyle and Its Effects on Demand; The Demand for "Illness"; The Demand for Quality: Choice of Provider Specialization; Other Studies of Demand for Medical Care; Applications and Extensions of Demand Theory; Decision Theory: Deriving the "Right" Demand Curve for Medical Care; Cost-Effectiveness Ratios and Demand Curves; Why Variations in Medical Practice?; Summary; Related Chapters in Handbook of Health Economics; Problems. Appendix to Chapter 5: An Example of Medical Decision TheoryCHAPTER 6 The Physician and the Physician-Firm; The "Firm"-Inputs, Output, and Cost; The Physician as Entrepreneur; The Physician-Firm and Its Production Function; The Physician as Diagnostician; Nonphysician Primary-Care Providers; The Size of the Firm-Group Practice of Medicine; Practice Ownership Patterns; The Physician as Labor; The Aggregate Supply Curve: Entry and Exit; The Open Economy: U.S.- and Internationally Trained Physicians; Summary; Related Chapters in Handbook of Health Economics; Problems.

Health Economics combines current economic theory, recent research, and health policy problems into a comprehensive overview of the field. This thorough update of a classic and widely used text follows author Charles E. Phelps' thirteen years of service as Provost of the University of Rochester. Accessible and intuitive, early chapters use recent empirical studies to develop essential methodological foundations. Later chapters build on these core concepts to focus on key policy areas, such as the structure and effects of Medicare reform, insurance plans, and new technologies in the health care community. This edition contains revised and updated data tables and contains information throughout the text on the latest changes that were made to the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA).