Barriers to treatment access for Chagas disease in Mexico.

Background: According to World Health Organization (WHO) prevalence estimates, 1.1 million people in Mexico are infected with Trypanosoma cruzi, the etiologic agent of Chagas disease (CD). However, limited information is available about access to antitrypanosomal treatment.

Cost-effectiveness analysis of coronary artery disease screening in HIV-infected men.

Background: HIV-infected patients are at increased risk of coronary artery disease (CAD). We evaluated the cost-effectiveness of cardiac screening for HIV-positive men at intermediate or greater CAD risk.

Design: We developed a lifetime microsimulation model of CAD incidence and progression in HIV-infected men.

The effects of city streets on an urban disease vector.

With increasing urbanization vector-borne diseases are quickly developing in cities, and urban control strategies are needed. If streets are shown to be barriers to disease vectors, city blocks could be used as a convenient and relevant spatial unit of study and control. Unfortunately, existing spatial analysis tools do not allow for assessment of the impact of an urban grid on the presence of disease agents.

Decision-analytic models to simulate health outcomes and costs in heart failure: a systematic review.

Chronic heart failure (CHF) is a critical public health issue with increasing effect on the healthcare budgets of developed countries. Various decision-analytic modelling approaches exist to estimate the cost effectiveness of health technologies for CHF. We sought to systematically identify these models and describe their structures.

Utility estimates for decision-analytic modeling in chronic heart failure--health states based on New York Heart Association classes and number of rehospitalizations.

Objectives: For economic evaluations of chronic heart failure (CHF) management strategies, utilities are not currently available for disease proxies commonly used in Markov models. Our objective was to estimate utilities for New York Heart Association (NYHA) classification and number of cardiovascular rehospitalizations.

Methods: EuroQol 5D data from the Eplerenone Post-acute Myocardial Infarction Heart Failure Efficacy and Survival Study trial were used to estimate utilities as a function of NYHA classification and number of cardiovascular rehospitalizations.