NOTES,  Political Science 5321,  Health Policy, Spring 2007

These are links to summary outlines of frameworks, concepts, perspectives and facts.
Outlines were presented and critiqued as part of the discussion on the dates indicated and, usually, again on the following session.
Abbreviations: HPF: Health Policy Framework; GPF: General Policy Frameworks Web: Links to key web sites; Glossary: Glossary provided by AcademyHealth
Accountability: Exams may concern material covered in these notes (except those noted as FYI) and in the links provided here (except the portions of the links under the heading For further information). The exams will cover links on the HPF and GPF only when the same links are made in the notes below.

Date Notes on Topics Covered Illustrations
Jan 8
Mon
a. Introduction to health policy

b. Course outline
a. Costs are lumpy; present insurance market poorly structured; state role
b. Form study team (2 members)
Jan 10 Wed a. Review of Books to be read
b. Policy and Administration have multiple and conflicting purposes
c. Amer.  govt is concerned with who and how to balance these purposes
d. Links are provided in these notes to materials to be studied for this course. Students are responsible for the material on the links, but not for the material on secondary links, that are FYI.
b.Purpose of government (e.g. why do we have federalism and why do we limit it): Liberty, Equality, Welfare (Ylivasaker)
    Professional perspectives as conflicts and complements: Efficiency, Value, Solidarity, Assurance, & Action (Diesing)
c. Levels of Government: 10th Federalist Paper.
    Separation of Powers: 51st Federalist Paper
Jan 12 Fri a. Multiple goals
b. Multiple forms of rationality

c. Divisions of  power

d. Muddling through
a. Liberty, equality, welfare
b. Efficiency, value, solidarity, assurance, action
c. Federalism; separation of powers
d. Lindblom
Jan 17 Wed a. Four divisions of power

b. Access/Measures (a/m)
a. Privacy concerns and information technology
b. Access to what care?
Jan 19 Fri a. Quality/Measures (q/m)



a. Lalonde categories,
   
Accreditation standards,
    Socioeconomic status

   Practice patterns, patient safety
Jan 22 Mon a. Syllabus update

b. Cost/Measures (c/m)
a. Slight changes in the "Research Results" assignment
b. Slower growth
Jan 24 Wed
a. AHRQ Research Activities, monthly reports
b. Review of Rolfs' visit




a. Policy oriented; only research supported by AHRQ
b. Epidemiology; incidence; prevalence
b. Medicare data--Bill Roper--Outcomes research
b. Epidemiology as sleuthing
Jan 26 Fri a. Cost/Measures (c/m)


b. Insurance


c. Political power changes

a. hospital & physician costs; projections; administration; per capita; long-term care
b. Necessary for "lumpiness"
b. Works poorly because of lumpiness
c. From physicians to insurers and pharma
Jan 29 Mon a. Sources: "Research Activities"
b. Insurance and insurance regulation
c. Access/Issues (a/i)
a. Pub Med classes at Eccles
b. Community rating; experience rating; ERISA
c. Multiple tiers?
Jan  31 Wed a. U.S. health spending compared with other post-industrial nations


b. Media reviews might consider changes in general conditions
c. Access/Issues
a. U.S. @ 16% of GDP: more than 50% higher than  most; twice G.B.
U.S. @ $6k/person: more than twice others; three times G.B.
b. General changes in regulatory purposes affect health policy
c. Health care: a commodity?
Feb 2
Fri
a. Cost/Issues (c/i)

b. Conciseness in communications

a. Who will pay the price for the costs of health care?
b. Seek few words and yet substance and specifics
Feb 5 Mon a. Quality/Issues (q/i)


a. Quality increases costs. Can it save expenditures? IOM reports re adverse events
Feb 7 Wed a. Incentives: functional or disfunctional
b. Budgeting
a. P4P? (c/h) Health insurance market? (a/h)
b. Spending for drug testing
Feb 9  Fri a. Multiple processes (Jones)
b. Budgeting: incrementalism
c. Costs: market incentives? (c/h)

d. Access: Relative values (a/h)

a. Agenda setting: autism
b. Complexity (muddling again)
c. Asymmetric info.; tax preferences; tort law
d. Equality v. market; multiple public purposes
Feb 12 Mon a. Rhetoric for Public Policy
b. Present your research

c. Quality: Habits (q/h)
d. Midterm
a. Respect, clarity, specifics
b. Utah Health Services Research Conference, April 6
c. Individuals; providers
d. A past exam
Feb 14 Wed a. Multiple actors (Gaus) and processes determine quality of care

b. Ethics: changing and conflicting criteria
a. Good quality: staff level?
Poor quality: high level policies?
Other way around, or both ways?
b. Over time and among such criteria as autonomy and justice
Feb 16 Fri

Feb
21
Wed
MIDTERM REVIEW
Feb 23 Fri
NO CLASS

Feb 26 Mon
MIDTERM EXAM

Feb 28 Wed a. Designs: It does matter who pays for care. The Insurance Mkt
a. Market incentives, competition for funds, etc  (a/d).

Mar 2
Fri
a. Readings for next Monday, March 5: (1) & (2)
b. Relative Power, i.e. Influence
a. Information technology

b. Changes in relative power of AMA, Pharma, Insurers, etc.
Mar 5 Mon


Mar 7 Wed a. Guest: Kim Wirthlin

Mar 19 Fri

Mar 12
Mon
a. Access politics a/p
b. Cost politics c/p
c. Quality politics q/p
a-c. Wilson's typology
   More than money
Mar 14 Wed a. political capacity as a scarce resource
a. reform of health care
Mar 16 Fri a. professional and program perspectives of administrators will shape policy
b. benefit-cost analysis: what to measure and other problems
a. Air pollution control, highway and public transportation, public or private insurance
b. automobiles v. public transit; railways v. trucks
Mar 26 Mon a. Health care studies: more than any individaul can track
b. Biomedical ethics, as in the "principleS" approach
a. Respect for uncertainty, patient/practitioner interaction, etc.
b. Accountability to patient, or community? (Multiple values!)
Mar 28 Wed
a. Medicare (Title XVIII)
b. Medicaid (Title XIX)
c. FYI: Proposals
d. Reform designs re cost c/d
e. Reform designs re quality q/d
a-b "Primers" by Kaiser Family Foundation
c. The Commonwealth Fund
d. Balance of  public & private?
e. Education: providers & patients
Mar 30 Fri a. Economic analysis a/tq; q/tq
b. Benefit/cost analysis
c. Decision trees
a. Screening for cancer?
b. Value of life, of health?
c. Costs of false positives
Apr 2 Mon a. Expected value
b. Benefit/cost analysis
c. Expected value; risk aversion
a-b. Comparisons of alternative public health programs
c. Insurance
Apr 4 Wed
a. Influence: money or voters?

b. Quality improvement

c. Benefit/cost problems
a. Lobbying and campaign expenditures
b. Uncertainty of measures; certanty of room for improvement
c. Use to sharpen judgement, not to replace it
Apr 6 Fri. a. Financial analysis c/tq
using financial statements
b. beneift-cost & cost-effectiveness analysis


c. "Garbage Can" -- chance & opportunity
a. Is net worth real, or is infrastructure neglected?
b. Financial measures; utility (utils); relative costs of years of life saved; or of quality adjusted life years (QUALYs)
c. Huntsman's million $s
Apr 9 Mon a. Administrative tools a/ti

b. Negotiating tools c/ti
a. Range of govt/private mix; Communication
b. Building future relationships
Apr 11 Wed a. Present interactions shape future relationships
b. Two way communication; two way change
c. Changing habits
a. Public education; negotiations; etc.
b. Burns on leadership: transactional & transformational
c. Difficult, but involve
 13 Fri a. Quality: SES? Personal connections? Facilities? Habits?
b. Significance of culture
a. Personal experiences: OB, appendix, voice, cataracts, etc.
b. Political cultures
Apr 16 Mon a. Culture and environment or framing of decision making
b. Friday April 20 class
c. Tort v. regulation

a. Cuban Missile Crisis

b. important links
c. Complications; Civil Action, Smoking & Politics
Apr 18 Wed
a. Final exam: 5 of 6 questions a. 2006 exam
Apr 20 Fri
a. The Jones outline
a. SB 132
Apr 23 Mon
a. Last links, not yet coverd in class: Habits as tools re quality: (q/ti); Conflicts within primary purposes as well as between them: Stone.
a. Habits re either providers or life style. Conflicts re whose liberty and for what acts.
Apr
25
Wed


May
1
Tue

FINAL EXAM: 8-10


"Notes" for 2006