Saving Nepal's Forest

Saving money, saving lives.

In 1996, Duke Children's Hospital was in serious trouble. Its $11 million annual operating loss had forced administrators to make cutbacks. As a result, some caregivers felt that the quality of care had deteriorated. Parents' complaints were on the rise. Frustrated staff members were quitting. In this article, Jon Meliones, DCH's chief medical director, candidly describes how his debt-ridden ho...

An Improved Approximation Bound for Spanning Star Forest and Color Saving

We present a simple algorithm for the maximum spanning star forest problem. We take advantage of the fact that the problem is a special case of complementary set cover and we adapt an algorithm of Duh and Fürer in order to solve it. We prove that this algorithm computes 193/240 ≈ 0.804-approximate spanning star forests; this result improves a previous lower bound of 0.71 by Chen et al. Although...

Electronic Medical Records: Saving Trees, Saving Lives

CONSIDER THIS IRONY OF MODERN LIFE: IN A MEDICAL CRISIS, EMERGENCY physicians would have an easier time accessing a patient’s bank account using his or her automatic teller machine card than they would finding critical medical history using his or her medical insurance card. Medical records, including crucial electrocardiograms, drug allergies, or medical conditions, are typically stored on pap...

Retirement plans, personal saving, and saving adequacy.

This Issue Brief addresses three questions raised by recent trends in personal saving: How are national savings measured and what is the meaning of the trends in measured personal saving rates, given what is included and what is not included in those measures? What is the effect of retirement saving programs--in particular, 401(k) plans and individual retirement accounts (IRAs)--on personal sav...

Saving lives, saving from death, saving from dying: reflections on 'over-valuing' identifiable victims.