The subject of pharmacoeconomics is increasingly being added to pharmacy curriculum. However, health economic books that target on health care professionals are very limited. Pizz and Lofland's Economic Evaluation in US Health Care Principal and Application is a text designed specifically for professional/ resident level education. While this easy-to-read text will be extremely useful in the classroom to help students develop basic cost-effectiveness concepts, it is also a good introductory text for pharmacists or health care practitioners who wish to gain some understanding in health economics.
The 176-page text may be categorized into 3 sections. The first section comprehensively addresses the health economic concepts and methodologies. This section consists of 5 chapters that detail (1) the current and historical context of economic evaluation of health care interventions in the United States; (2) methods of measuring economic outcomes; (3) health-related quality of life concepts and measurements (4) health-related productivity; and (5) risk adjustment and study design in observational studies. The second section of the book consists of 2 chapters that provide informative examples of the application of economic evaluation in pharmaceutical industry and formulary decision making. The third section consists of 2 chapters covering the perspectives of US regulators (eg, Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, Food and Drug Administration) on the current and future role of economic evaluation in the United States.
This book has several key strengths. First, different from many books full of economic jargons, this text is unique in conveying the health economic concepts, principles, and methods in plain language that can be easily understood by pharmacists and health practitioners without any economic backgrounds. Second, this book especially meets the needs of pharmacists by including examples of the applications of economic evaluation in determining the value of pharmaceuticals. The cases presented in chapter 6 and chapter 7 could easily prove useful when the pharmacy graduates and residents arrive in the workplace such as in the pharmaceutical industry, hospital, or health insurance industry. Third, this text discusses an important topic that is usually neglected by health economic books regarding how the political and ethical issues have been affected economic evaluation in the United States. At last, this book facilitates both teaching and learning by providing plenty of cases, discussion questions, and suggested readings.
Economic Evaluation in US Health Care Principal and Application provides a comprehensive and current overview of the health economic evaluations in the US health care system with particular emphasis on the evaluation on pharmaceuticals. This book is an excellent choice for an introductory course in pharmacoeconomics or as a source for foundation information for pharmacy practitioners who are considering a career related to pharmacy benefit management. The publication of this book is an important addition to the current available texts on health economics.