November 2010

African Americans had more asthma-specific emergency care utilization, and African Americans and Native Americans/Aleutians/Eskimos were more likely to report lower asthma-specific quality-of-life scores, than whites.

When preventive care was exempt from the deductible, well-child visits did not change for children switching from traditional plans to high-deductible plans.

This article describes the development and capabilities of a Webbased decision support system for care managers working in the context of the chronic care model.

Extended-duration thromboprophylaxis (>14 days) for total hip replacement/total knee replacement was associated with significantly lower risk for thromboembolic and bleeding events than short-duration thromboprophylaxis.

Authors from The Brookings Institution update their recommendations by focusing on 3 concrete objectives to slow spending and improve quality of care within the next 5 years.

Quality measures showed large, though mixed, differences between Medicare fee-for-service and Medicare Advantage programs.

HEDIS-defined persistent asthma is generally consistent with survey-defined persistent asthma over a 3-year period.

A targeted computerized alert at the time of physician order entry reduced the use of D-dimer testing among patients 65 years and older.

A 13-year study of actual compensation amounts and rates paid to solo general dentists by a capitation or managed care type of insurance plan.