Many clinicians remain unsure of the relevance of measuring quality of life to their clinical practice. In health economics quality of life measures have become the standard means of assessing the results of health care interventions and, more controversially, the means of prioritising funding; but they have many other applications. This article--the first of three on measuring quality of life-...

Economic evaluation in modern health care systems is seen as a transparent scientific framework that can be used to advance progress towards improvements in population health at the best possible value. Despite the perceived superiority that trial-based studies have in terms of internal validity, economic evaluations often employ observational data. In this review, the interface between econome...

Pharmacoeconomics is defined as the science of identifying and comparing costs and the consequences of drug therapy in health care programs. As a sub-discipline of health economics, pharmacoeconomics, is fairly a new research discipline in the world which has come about mainly in response to economic pressures on health systems. The root of this pressure lies in the mismatch of enhanced demand ...

Choices need to be made between competing uses of health care resources. There is debate about how these choices should be made, who should make them and the criteria upon which they should be made. Evaluation of health care is an important part of this debate. It has been suggested that the contribution of health economics to the evaluation of health promotion is limited, both because the meth...

TO THE EDITOR: Koczwara et al emphasize that dissemination and implementation science should broaden its reach beyond its current geographic limits (including the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, and Australia). However, even within these limits, critical issues remain in the field of oncology. In fact, although evidence behind cancer control strategies may not differ around the globe...

It has been said that “goodness without knowledge is weak and feeble, yet knowledge without goodness is dangerous.”1 Peter Diamond is one of those extremely rare people who combine knowledge and goodness. Indeed—and I hope this doesn’t offend anyone in the room—Peter is probably the smartest person I know. In addition to that, he is simply a wonderful person and colleague. I am thrilled that th...

It is time hospice and palliative care grew up. We can no longer expect governments to treat them as a charity case, with just enough funding to avert adverse newspaper headlines. Increased financial pressure from the global economic recession and fiscal crisis on already stretched budgets means tough decisions have to be made about where to invest limited health funds. Consequently, we need to...