BACKGROUND Acceptance of generic medicines by patients is an essential factor given that they are the end users of these medicines. In fact, adequate knowledge and positive perceptions are prerequisite to patients' acceptance and use of generic medicines. OBJECTIVE To assess the current belief and views of patients about generic medicines in Malaysia. METHOD This was a self-administered que...

1 who work for the industry-funded Hudson Institute, advocate the use of patented drugs, pointing to what they say are risks associated with generic drugs. They confuse generic drugs with old, substandard, ineffective, and counterfeit drugs. Generic does not mean old. The 1996 World Trade Organisation (WTO) Agreements mandate all member countries to provide 20-year patent protection for medicin...

Residents in care homes are more likely to be prescribed multiple medicines yet often have little involvement in these prescribing decisions. Reviewing and stopping inappropriate medicines is not currently adopted across the health economy. This Health Foundation funded Shine project developed a pragmatic approach to optimising medicines in care homes while involving all residents in decision m...

The field of forensic psychiatry implies a distinction between it and other areas of psychiatry. Whether this field can be so clearly staked out as to be delineated as a subspecialty of psychiatry is the subject of this brief paper. I propose (1) to examine the question of whether it is justified to speak of forensic psychiatry as a subspecialty; (2) to explore the definition of forensic psychi...

Specialty drugs are often many times more expensive than traditional drugs, which raises questions of affordability and value. We compared the value of specialty and traditional drugs approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in the period 1999–2011. To do this, we identified published estimates of additional health gains (measured in quality-adjusted life-years, or QALYs) and increase...

The authors details information related to the 2012 certification processing activity of the Bureau of Osteopathic Specialists, which oversees the work of the 18 specialty certifying boards of the American Osteopathic Association.

background the unregulated availability and irrational use of tuberculosis (tb) medicines is a major issue of public health concern globally. governments of many low- and middle-income countries (lmics) have committed to regulating the quality and availability of tb medicines, but with variable success. regulation of tb medicines remains an intractable challenge in many settings, but the reason...

Hospitals and physicians are developing and marketing discrete and profitable specialty-service lines. Although closely affiliated specialist physicians are central to hospitals' service-line products, other physicians compete directly with hospitals via physician-owned specialty facilities. Specialty-service lines may be provided in a variety of settings, both inside and outside traditional ho...

This article explores whether Medicare pays more for the same outpatient services provided in an acute specialty hospital than in an ambulatory surgery center (ASC). How financially dependent a specialty hospital is on ASC-eligible services is also investigated. Medicare outpatient claims in 43 orthopedic and 12 surgical specialty hospitals in 2004 were repriced using ASC pricing software. Paym...