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Patients' Needs and Healthcare Markets

A.Y. 2019/2020
6
Max ECTS
40
Overall hours
SSD
SECS-P/01
Language
English
Learning objectives
The objective of the course is to get a better understanding of the mechanisms driving the health expenditures. At the end of the course the students are expected to be familiar with the main economic models adopted to explain variations in health expenditures and health outcomes, and how the policy maker should intervene to deal with those variations.
Expected learning outcomes
The students are expected to get two main outcomes. First they will be knowledgeable of the different institutional settings which characterize the policy makers' responses to the failures in the health care market. This first part will be achieved through the work on the textbook. Second they will be able to critically discuss and evaluate reforms of the healthcare sector on the base of the available data. This second part will be achieved through discussions of empirical papers in small group. They are expected to be responsible citizens and being able to understand in the future the consequences of political proposals to reform the health care system.

Lesson period: Third trimester

Lessons timetable

Assessment methods: Esame
Assessment result: voto verbalizzato in trentesimi

Exams calendar

Single course

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Course syllabus and organization

Single session

Lesson period
Third trimester
Course syllabus
This course explores the health care sector and health policy issues from an economic perspectives, making use of case studies and empirical evidence. Microeconomics tools will be used to analyze the functioning of different pieces of the health care system, while empirical methods will be considered to test the main predictions. Topics will range from fundamental subjects, such as the demand for and the supply of health to more recent developments, as the role of patients' bias in explaining geographical variations in healthcare consumption. The objective of the course is to get a better understanding of the mechanisms driving the health expenditures. At the end of the course the students are expected to be familiar with the main economic models adopted to explain variations in health expenditures and health outcomes, and how the policy maker should intervene to intervene in those variations.

1. Global Health Challanges
Facts
Paradoxes
Making sense of evidence using economic theory

2. Demand for health and health care (Battacharya Chapters 1-4)
3. Supply of health care (Battacharya Chapters 5-6)
4. Health Policy (Battacharya Chapters 15-19)
5. Public Health Economics (Battacharya Chapters 20-22)

6. Papers with applications of the economic theory
Prerequisites for admission
Microeconomics
Teaching methods
Lectures and exercises classes
During the lectures, interaction with the students will be implemented using socrative, a program which allows the students to vote in class
Teaching Resources
Health Economics, Jay Battacharya, Timothy Hyde, and Peter Tu, Palgrave, Last edition
Assessment methods and Criteria
The final grade will be based on a paper on an application of the microeconomic theory to health (50% of the grade) and a final exam (50% of the grade). The paper will be handle a week before the final exam. The final exam will be written, 12 questions with multiple choices, each question counting 2.5 points. Mistakes will be punished with a -0.5 penalty. Students will have 95 minutes to do the final exam.
SECS-P/01 - ECONOMICS - University credits: 6
Lessons: 40 hours
Professor: Grembi Veronica
Shifts:
-
Professor: Grembi Veronica