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Science 26 May 1978:
Vol. 200. no. 4344, pp. 875 - 878
DOI: 10.1126/science.417402
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Articles

Science, Vol 200, Issue 4344, 875-878
Copyright © 1978 by American Association for the Advancement of Science

articles

Evaluation of medical practices

HS Frazier and HH Hiatt

Evaluation of the efficacy of a medical intervention requires valid measurements of both its benefits and risks as compared to those of alternative forms of management. The requisite measurements are more difficult to make than this simple description suggests, and the accumulation of information is further inhibited by certain characteristics of our pattern of health care. These features include, for example, discontinuous care by a variety of unrelated providers, inadequate records, the autonomy of physicians as decision-makers, financial disincentives, ambiguities in what we mean by "experimental" and "accepted" forms of therapy, and failure to see continuing evaluation as a necessary component of the cost of providing good medical care. Although no single change will solve all the problems of evaluation, several offer promise of improving our ability to choose from among medical interventions those most likely to be useful.


THIS ARTICLE HAS BEEN CITED BY OTHER ARTICLES:
Persuasive Communication and Medical Technology Assessment.
J. D. Winkler, K. N. Lohr, and R. H. Brook (1985)
Arch Intern Med 145, 314-317
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Health Care Technology and the Inevitability of Resource Allocation and Rationing Decisions: Part I.
R. W. Evans (1983)
JAMA 249, 2047-2053
   Abstract »    PDF »
Planning and Implementation: A Comparative Perspective on Health Policy.
C. Altenstetter and J. W. Bjorkman (1981)
International Political Science Review/ Revue internationale de science pol 2, 11-42
   Abstract »    PDF »


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Science. ISSN 0036-8075 (print), 1095-9203 (online)