Creating Price Indexes for Measuring Productivity in Mental Health Care

Susan H. Busch, Division of Health Policy and Administration, Yale Medical School
Ernst R. Berndt, Alfred P. Sloan School of Management, MIT and NBER
Richard G. Frank, Department of Health Care Policy, Harvard Medical School and NBER

Abstract

Economists have long suggested that to be reliable, a preferred medical care price index should employ time-varying weights to measure outcomes-adjusted changes in the price of treating an episode of illness. In this article, we report on several years of research developing alternative indexes for the treatment of the acute phase of major depression, for the period 1991–1996. The introduction of new treatment technologies in the past two decades suggests well-known measurement issues may be prominent in constructing such a price index.

We report on the results of four successively re

Recommended Citation

Susan H. Busch, Ernst R. Berndt, and Richard G. Frank (2001) "Creating Price Indexes for Measuring Productivity in Mental Health Care," Forum for Health Economics & Policy: Vol. 4: (Frontiers in Health Policy Research), Article 6.
http://www.bepress.com/fhep/4/6

 
 
 
 

ISSN: 1558-9544 ©1999-2008 The Berkeley Electronic Press™ All rights reserved.

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