Until recently PET scanning has been available only at major universities or teaching hospitals possessing the necessary resources and expertise to operate a research PET facility. Most dedicated PET centers cost several millions of dollars, and include a cyclotron, a radiochemistry laboratory to synthesize PET radiopharmaceuticals, a multicrystal dedicated PET camera, advanced computer f...

BACKGROUND Colorectal cancer (CRC) incidence rises with age, and most CRC arises from adenomatous polyps. It was therefore hypothesized that increased use of CRC screening and polypectomy in younger persons might yield CRC-related savings later in life for payers such as Medicare. METHODS Using a decision analytic Markov model, the impact of increased CRC screening uptake on healthcare payers...

BACKGROUND Responding to research confirming the link between nurse staffing and patient outcomes, 14 states have introduced legislation to limit patient-to-nurse ratios. However, increased staffing places a considerable financial burden on hospitals. OBJECTIVE We sought to determine the cost-effectiveness of various nurse staffing ratios. RESEARCH DESIGN This was a cost-effectiveness analy...

BACKGROUND Divalproex sodium is a mood stabilizer used in the United States for the treatment of acute mania associated with bipolar disorder. Recently, olanzapine, an atypical antipsychotic, was approved for the treatment of acute mania. This study compares the clinical, health-related quality of life (HRQL), and economic outcomes of divalproex and olanzapine in the treatment of acute mania as...

OBJECTIVES The present study sought to determine the value of fractional flow reserve (FFR) compared with stress perfusion scintigraphy (SPS) in patients with recent unstable angina/non-ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction (UA/NSTEMI). BACKGROUND Fractional flow reserve, an invasive index of stenosis severity, is a reliable surrogate for SPS in patients with normal left ventricular func...

OBJECTIVE To examine trends in psychotropic medication utilization and costs for children and adolescents between January 1, 1997, and December 31, 2000. METHODS Pharmacy claims were analyzed for mental health users 17 years and younger (N = 83 039) from a national database covering 1.74 million privately insured youths. Utilization rates and costs for dispensed medications were compared acro...

OBJECTIVE To determine the compensation, benefit package, and level of satisfaction with the benefits of nationally registered emergency medical technicians (NREMTs) in 2001. METHODS The Longitudinal EMT Attribute Demographic Study (LEADS) Project included an 18-question snapshot survey on compensation with the 2001 core survey. This survey was sent to 4,835 randomly selected NREMTs. A total ...

Diabetic foot complications result in huge costs for both society and the individual patients. Few reports on the health-economic consequences of diabetic foot infections have been published. In studies considering a wide societal perspective, costs of antibiotics were relatively low, whereas total costs for topical treatment were high relative to the total costs of foot infections. Total direc...

BACKGROUND Pharmacologic pre- and postconditioning with sevoflurane compared with total IV anesthesia in patients undergoing liver surgery reduced complication rates as shown in 2 recent randomized controlled trials. However, the potential health economic consequences of these different anesthesia regimens have not yet been assessed. METHODS An expostcost analysis of these 2 trials in 129 pat...

OBJECTIVE To assess the cost and cost effectiveness of hydroxymethylglutaryl (HMG)-CoA reductase inhibitor (statin) therapy for the primary prevention of major coronary events in the U.S. population with diabetes and LDL cholesterol levels > or =100 mg/dl, especially in the population with LDL cholesterol levels 100-129 mg/dl. RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS Analyses were performed using populati...