Health Economics: Fundamentals and Flow of Funds

A practical primer to the dynamic field of health economics. Written by Thomas Getzen, a leading academic and practitioner, and currently Director of the International Health Economics Association, this complete, accessible text introduces students to the economic analysis of medical markets and the production of health.
Updated and revised with new cases and the latest developments in the field, the new Second Edition traces the economic rationale and development of the medical care organization. It thoroughly introduces students to the principles and concepts of health economics without requiring prolonged preparatory work or extensive mathematical manipulation.
* Cases illustrate practical uses of economic theory in each chapter.
* More streamlined presentation of macro and historical materials.
* Covers the relationship of marketing to marginal cost.

Booknews

An introduction to the economic analysis of medical markets and the production of health, primarily for students of medicine, public health, or administration who have little or no background in economics, but also for beginning economics students. Describes the incentives and organizational structure of the health care industry with a Flow of Funds approach, outlines the ongoing evolution of managed care in the US, and macroeconomic perspectives the dynamics of change and determinants of national health spending. Annotation c. by Book News, Inc., Portland, Or.

Thomas E. Getzen is Professor of Risk, Insurance and Health Management  at Temple University and the founder and Executive Director of iHEA, the International Health Economics Association. After receiving an undergraduate degree from Yale University, he worked for the U.S.P.H.S. Centers for Disease Control Venereal Disease program in New York and Los Angeles, and then obtained an MHA degree in Medical Care Organization and Ph.D. in Economics from the University of Washington. Dr. Getzen’s main research contributions have been in the areas of contracting, price indexes and forecasting of health care spending. His consulting work has included employee benefit negotiations, laboratory diagnostics, risk assessment, and capital financing for managed care. Dr. Getzen has been a visiting professor at the University of York (U.K.), the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, and the Center for Health and Wellbeing of the Woodrow Wilson School at Princeton University. He has served on the boards of Covenant House, a local community health center in Northwest Philadelphia, MSI, a venture-capital financed managed behavioral health care corporations, CHE, a large provider system with over 60 hosp itals and nursing homes. Dr. Getzen is a member of the editorial boards of Health Economics and the Journal of Health Administration Education.