Would Having More Primary Care Doctors Cut Health Spending Growth?

Primary care doctors and population health.

Dr Gulliford is to be congratulated on reporting the first examination of the relationship between the availability of primary care doctors and population health in England. His work follows the calculations in the USA by Starfield that each extra family physician is associated with a reduction of deaths of 34 US citizens per 100 000 population, a finding not replicated for specialists. His fin...

Controlling Health Care Spending: More Patient "Skin in the Game?"

States with more health care spending have better-quality health care: lessons about Medicare.

Based on broad measures of health system quality and performance, states with more total health spending per capita have better-quality care. This fact contrasts with a previous finding that states with higher Medicare spending per enrollee have poorer-quality care. However, quality results from the total funds available and not from Medicare or any single payer. Moreover, Medicare payments are...

More doctors or better care?

The Canadian Medical Association's More Doctors, More Care campaign seeks to align physician supply targets with policy decisions elsewhere in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). Using OECD data for 19 countries to assess the relationship between physician supply and healthcare outcomes, we have determined that there is no association between avoidable mortality a...

The global slowdown in health care spending growth.