Music therapy

When we think of medicine we think of pharmaceutical medications, surgery and other interventions.  But can music also be used to heal.  According to the American Music Therapy Association, the answer is yes.  A paper by Gold et al. (2006) finds this is the case for patients with schizophrenia: In people hospitalised with schizophrenia, adding…

HDHP on the rise

High deductible health plans (HDHP) are on the rise. According to the Kaiser Family Foundation 2015 Employer Health Benefits Survey, 25 percent of all covered workers have an HDHP in 2015, up from just 8% in 2009. For small firms, 69% of workers have a deductible of $1,000 or more compared to only 39% of…

Synthetic Control Method

A common method for measuring the effect of policy interventions is the difference in difference (DiD) approach.  In essence, one examines the change in outcomes among observations subject to the policy intervention and compare them agains observations that were not eligible for the policy intervention. A key assumption for this approach to be valid is…

Is reducing disparity enough?

A recent paper in by Martin et al. (2015) finds that Medicaid Managed Care programs in Kentucky reduced monthly professional visits. Further, the decrease in the number of professional visits was larger for whites than for non-whites. The authors conclude: We find evidence that MMC [Medicaid Managed Care] has the possibility to reduce racial/ethnic disparities…