Objectives To assess whether recently-proposed alternatives to the quality-adjusted life year (QALY), intended to address concerns about discrimination, are suitable for informing resource allocation decisions. Methods We consider two alternatives to the QALY: the Health Years in Total (HYT), recently proposed by Basu et al., and the Equal Value of Life Years Gained (evLYG),…
BackgroundPostpartum depression (PPD) affects 10-15% of women, is costly and debilitating, yet often remains undiagnosed. Within Alberta, Canada, screening is conducted at public health well child clinics using the Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale. If screened high-risk, women are offered referral to their family physicians for follow up diagnosis and treatment.
| Carmel Montgomery, Colleen M. Norris, Darryl B. Rolfson, Henry Stelfox, Mohamad A. Zibdawi, Sean Bagshaw, Thanh Nguyen, Steven R. Meyer
There is limited information about the impact of frailty on public payer costs in cardiac surgery. This study aimed to determine quality-adjusted life-years (QALYs) and costs associated with pre-operative frailty in patients referred for cardiac surgery.
Highlights•One third of ICU deaths occur within 24 hours of admission.•Patients who die early are older, more likely frail and receive more advanced life support.•Correlates of early death include age, acuity and Emergency Department admission.•Future work should explore the role of clinician and family decision-making in this group. AbstractPurposeTo describe…
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…
| Safoura Moeeni
I examine the effects of education on the labor force participation (LFP) of married women in an intra-household collective decision framework with imperfectly transferable utility and endogenous bargaining powers. In this case, individuals’ pre-marriage choices, including educational choices and matching on the marriage market, determine their bargaining power. Education…
Health Technology Assessment (HTA) has always sought to incorporate the evidence of all patients affected in the decision-making process. While health system budgets could increase to cover costs of new technologies, the relevant patients are those benefitting from access to the technology being appraised. More recently, with health system budgets effectively fixed, costs of new…
A substantial proportion of patients admitted to intensive care units (ICUs) are frail; however, the epidemiology of frailty has not been explored at a population-level. Following implementation of a validated frailty measure into a provincial ICU clinical information system, we describe the population-based prevalence and outcomes of frailty in patients admitted to ICUs.