1. Maximizing Value in Health Care. 1.1. Introduction. 1.2. The rationale for numerical measures of value. 1.3. Available numerical measures of value -- 2. Three Basic Issues in Economic Evaluation. 2.1. At which levels of decision may economic evaluation be helpful? 2.2. Values when caring for others versus values when thinking about self-interest. 2.3. Resource allocation across programs is essentially about making person trade-offs -- Appendix. Welfare economics and person trade-offs -- 3. QALYs. 3.1. What are QALYs? 3.2. Two major problems with QALYs -- 4. Concerns for Fairness. 4.1. What is fairness? 4.2. QALYs and fairness. 4.3. Fairness and gains in utility. 4.4. Ways of measuring concerns for fairness. 4.5. Societal concerns for severity. 4.6. Rules of thumb concerning severity. 4.7. Societal concerns for realizing potentials for health. 4.8. Rules of thumb concerning severity and potentials for health. 4.9. The self-interest perspective behind a veil of ignorance
4.10. The degree of error in utility-based predictions of societal preferences. 4.11. The importance of the duration of a treatment effect. 4.12. Does discounting for time preference solve the duration problem? 4.13. The importance of age. 4.14. The importance of cost/the number of people helped. 4.15. The importance of the chance of successful treatment. 4.16. Summary. 4.17. Are better weights or additional equity weights a solution? -- 5. The Limitations of Utility Measurement. 5.1. Ex ante or ex post utilities? 5.2. Whom to ask. 5.3. How to ask -- 6. Ways to Go. 6.1. The problems. 6.2. The person trade-off issue revisited. 6.3. Acknowledging the value of disabled people's lives. 6.4. Disability Adjusted Life Years (DALYs). 6.5. Toward cost-value analysis. 6.6. Constructing a comprehensive value table. 6.7. Measurement problems. 6.8. The relevance of cost-value analysis in practical decision making. 6.9. Conclusion -- Annex: An Example of Cost-Value Analysis
Bibliography
Includes bibliographical references (pages 146-154) and index
