Health Economics and Financing (Thomas E. Getzen)
Average rating: 7.0/10, based on 1 rating.
| User | David Haardt (Instructor at McMaster University (research-oriented university) in Canada) | |||
| Date posted | 2008-04-01 15:55:52 | |||
| Rating | 7/10 Edition to which comments/rating relate: 3 | |||
| A good alternative, but with some weaknesses | ||||
| This textbook is less expensive than the best-known alternatives (Folland/Goodman/Stano or Phelps). The competitor textbook by Jacobs and Rapoport is even less expensive, but I was not very happy with it when browsing through the exam copy. However, the textbook by Getzen is also quite brief at 458 pages, so it may be worthwhile to look at the table of contents to see whether it will provide appropriate coverage for your course. In general I found it to be a good textbook. However, there are also a few shortcomings. For instance, it uses far less economic theory than Phelps (which, for some types of student audiences, is certainly appropriate), and it lacks the math/stats tools chapters of Folland/Goodman/Stano, even though Getzen offers online appendices that cover some of these tools. In that sense it is best used for a mixed audience with a considerable proportion of non-economics students, or for classes of mainly non-economics students (such as health sciences students). One weakness is that some of the discussion is too superficial and sometimes biased, using the language of politics than of economics. This is particularly true of the last chapter ("Value for Money in the Future of Health Care") which is very brief and not very instructive. Chapter 16, on "History, Demography, and the Growth of Modern Medicine," contains very valuable information on the importance of demographics and food supply, but the connections to health care are not made clear enough. Also, many of the issues discussed as belonging to the "Agricultural Age" can still be seen nowadays in many low- and middle-income countries. Here, it would have been informative to include more examples about the world as it is today. This has been done in some contexts (such as when talking about Russia and its sharply declining life expectancy after the regime change) but not in others. Chapter 17, on "International Comparisons of Health and Health Expenditures," contains several sections on sample countries to represent the groups of low-, middle-, and high-income countries, which were written by local experts. This is of course desirable, but unfortunately the links between what can be seen in those different countries are not always very clear, so students may find it difficult to combine this rather separate information in a meaningful way. Also, the section on Mexico was co-authored by the Mexican minister of health which renders some of the discussion overly positive. Japan and Germany were selected as representing high-income countries which means that Canada was, as often, unfortunately not considered. This is particularly disappointing since the other chapters often refer to the Canadian health care system as a natural comparison for the U.S. health care system. Overall, Chapter 17 is rather descriptive and, like Chapter 16, is not connected well enough to the rest of the textbook. Overall, it is certainly a good textbook, and it saves students around $25 compared to some of the usual suspects, but it certainly has its weaknesses. However, especially for classes with a mixed audience or with an audience of mainly non-economics students, it is definitely worth a look. |
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