The big news in the Chicago hospital market today was the announcement by Loyola University Chicago that they have signed a letter of intent (LOI) to merge the Loyola University Health System (LUHS) into the larger Trinity Health network. This follows a national trend of hospitals joining larger systems, perhaps due to the regulatory pressures […]
Given that many of the major reforms of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act will not be enacted until 2014 there has been much discussion of potential changes to the existing legislation. This ranges from subtle modifications of small details of the bill to the Republicans’ recent vote to repeal the entire legislation. In […]
The decisions facing patients, providers and CMS (given that much of this care is funded via Medicare) as to what constitutes desirable (and cost-effective?) health care at the end of life are enormously challenging. Such decisions are often fraught with concerns over balancing the sanctity of an individual’s life with the realities of tremendous amounts of money being spent on minuscule chances of recovery to at best a highly compromised state of living. As technologies have developed, the possibilities for sustaining life have increased substantially. But along with increases to longevity, there are often concerns over the quality of the last few weeks or months of life.
Welcome to my new blog on issues of the economics of the health care industry. I’ll be covering a wide array of topics potentially relevant to health care managers, researchers and those interested in health care reform.
With spending of more than $2.5 trillion in the U.S. healthcare industry, the importance of this sector in the […]
I am an assistant professor of economics at Loyola University Chicago. I teach courses in health economics, econometrics and microeconomics. My research interests are focused on health behaviors, including studies on the economic consequences of obesity and causal factors in aggregate fluctuations in suicide rates.
Some other health care blogs that I read regularly include:
Al Gini
Gini in a BottleAndrew Keyt
Family MattersAnne Reilly
N.B.*Cliff Shultz
Emerging MarketsEve Geroulis
The PolisJohn Caltagirone
The Value StreamMaciek Nowak
The Supply ChainMary Ann McGrath
The Market ShareQuinlan Ramble
The Quinlan RambleRaymond Benton Jr
Sustainability and Social EnterpriseStacy Neier
Q the RunwayTimothy Classen
The Pulse