BACKGROUND A dramatic increase in healthcare expenditures is a major health policy concern worldwide. Understanding factors that underlie the growth in healthcare expenditures is essential to assist decision-makers in finding best policies to manage healthcare costs. We aimed to examine the determinants of healthcare spending in Iran over the periods of 1978-2011. METHODS A time series analys...

This afternoon, the government published revised regulations under Section 75 of the Health & Social Care Act 2012. The government has hastily re-written these regulations, the first draft of which would have forced commissioners to open just about every part of the NHS up to private sector competition. Howls of protest from grassroots [2] groups [3], healthcare professionals [4], all the [5] R...

Changes in the Internet, World Wide Web technologies and services lead to new developments in the way of E-Government efforts to provide better services to citizens and businesses due to governments handles their internal operations. One of the revolutionary developments comes from adoption of wireless technologies in government related activities. E-Governance is an influential tool for bringi...

This article critiques the notion of abortion as a “positive liberty.” The author argues that the court’s holding in Roe v. Wade created a negative right to abortion, meaning that an individual seeking an abortion is merely protected from government interference. Over time, ”pro-abortion” advocates have sought a positive right to access an abortion, including government funding. The author find...

Home healthcare and hospice clinicians are increasingly working with patients for whom English is not their primary language. Provision of culturally respectful and acceptable patient-centered care includes both an awareness of cultural beliefs that influence the patient's health and also the ability to provide the patient with health information in the language with which he or she is most com...

Conditional cash transfer programs in Latin America impose specific requirements and responsibilities on beneficiary households, in order to upgrade education levels, improve drop-out rates and eliminate child labor, while enhancing health and nutrition indicators. Although counterpart healthcare conditions are common to all these programs, government strategies differ in terms of reaching thei...

PURPOSE Key issues in measuring and improving the quality of healthcare are discussed with an emphasis on applying quality-improvement principles in ambulatory care pharmacy practice. SUMMARY The various perspectives on healthcare quality (including those of patients, providers, and payers) are reviewed, and the basic principles of quality measurement and improvement are outlined. Many health...

BACKGROUND Although allied health clinicians play a key role in the provision of healthcare, embedding a culture of research within public and private health systems remains a challenge. In this rapid review we critically evaluate frameworks for embedding research into routine allied health practice, as the basis for high quality, safe, efficient and consumer-focused care. METHODS A rapid rev...

Government and private health agencies are being compelled by internal and external forces to integrate their electronic records and resources. Many medical systems consist of isolated, disparate implementations that are now being required to interoperate with other systems. This study reviewed the literature on healthcare and other large systems of systems (SOS) implementations and frameworks ...