The recent report by Alberta’s Blue ribbon panel on the province’s finances denounced Alberta’s Fee-for-Service (FFS) model as a significant source of inefficiency and cost within the health system, going as far as to suggest legislating a non-FFS model. If pursued, Alberta would be the first province since the start of Canadian Medicare to fully shift away from…
To examine the association between individual-level deprivation and health-related quality of life (HRQL) in the general population.
Overconsumption of sugar-sweetened beverages (SSBs) contributes to childhood and adult obesity and numerous related diseases, including heart disease, strokes, cancers, and type 2 diabetes. It also increases healthcare costs. Sugary drink taxes have been implemented in several countries to curb sugar intake. However, there is a concern that sugary drink taxes are regressive. This…
Canada recently entered into two multinational trade agreements (i.e., the Canada, United States, and Mexico Trade Agreement; and the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement with the European Union). The resulting federal policy changes will prolong periods of market protection afforded to eligible brand-name prescription drugs by extending competition-blocking patent and data…
This study examined children’s health care service use, mothers’ workforce participation, and mothers’ community engagement based on children’s risk of developmental delay.
This analysis, published in BMC Psychiatry, aimed to determine cost-effectiveness of a stepped-care pathway for depression in adults in primary care versus standard care (SC), treatment-as-usual (TAU), and online cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT).
OBJECTIVES: To examine the resource use and healthcare costs for chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) in Alberta, Canada between 2008 and 2016 and model the future costs to 2030.
The aim of this study is to describe how generic preference?based health?related quality of life (HRQoL) instruments have been used in research involving children with neurodevelopmental disorders (NDD).
The EQ-5D-5 L and the SF-12 are the most commonly used generic measures of health-related quality of life among people with arthritis. However, there is little evidence on the extent to which the individual dimensions and domains of these instruments perform among this population. The objective was to examine the discriminative validity of the EQ-5D-5 L and the SF-12…
Most pharmaceutical expenditure in Canada is private. In 2017, Canadian provincial, territorial and federal governments were reported to have spent $14.5 billion on pharmaceuticals, accounting for only 43% of total pharmaceutical expenditure.1 A combination of private insurance and patient expenditures in the form of direct payment for pharmaceuticals, deductibles and other…
Education of women regarding healthy lifestyle choices is an important function for prenatal care providers. Within Canada, women choose to receive pregnancy care from one of a variety of publicly funded care providers. This study examines the association between the type of care provider(s) seen during pregnancy and the provision of advice related to nutrition, weight management,…
It is the first whole diet comparison using Canada’s best dietary data spanning from 2004 to 2015 and showing a modest improvements in diet quality. The economic burden of unhealthy eating is enormous. In 2004 this was estimated for Canada to be $ 3.2 Billion per year. Due to the modest improvements in diet quality it came down with $ 219 million by 2015. Policy and decision…
Little is known about resource use and cost burden of Acute Myocardial Infarction (AMI) beyond the index event. We examined resource use and care costs during the first and each subsequent year, among patients with incident AMI.
Few studies have estimated the economic burden of chronic diseases (e.g., type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, cancers) attributable to unhealthy eating. In this study, we estimated the economic burden of chronic disease attributable to not meeting Canadian food recommendations. We first obtained chronic disease risk estimates for intakes of both protective (1. vegetables;…
Early detection of neurodevelopmental disorders (NDDs) enables access to early interventions for children. We assess the Ages and Stages Questionnaire (ASQ)’s ability to identify children with a NDD in population data.
Little is known about the cost burden of acute myocardial infarction (AMI) on healthcare systems. Accordingly, we examined the long-term trends of healthcare costs for AMI in the province of Alberta, Canada.
The recently released Canadian cardiac care quality indicators include 30-day in-hospital mortality and readmission rates after percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) and isolated coronary artery bypass grafting (CABG). We examined long-term trends and provincial variations in these outcomes among acute myocardial infarction (AMI) patients.
Economic evaluation is a tool used to inform decision makers on the efficiency of comparative healthcare interventions and inform resource allocation decisions. There is a growing need for the use of economic evaluations to assess the value of interventions for children with neurodevelopmental disorders (NDDs), a population that has increasing demands for healthcare services. Unfortunately,…
Healthcare providers, managers and policy-makers in many jurisdictions are focused on a common goal: optimizing value and quality of care provided to their citizens within a resource envelope. Health technology reassessment is a structured, evidence-based assessment of the clinical, social, ethical and economic effects of a technology currently used in the healthcare system to…
