The cost of a pediatric neurocritical care program for traumatic brain injury: a retrospective cohort study.

Background: Inpatient care for children with severe traumatic brain injury (sTBI) is expensive, with inpatient charges averaging over $70,000 per case (Hospital Inpatient, Children Only, National Statistics. Diagnoses- clinical classification software (CCS) principal diagnosis category 85 coma, stupor, and brain damage, and 233 intracranial injury. Diagnoses by Aggregate charges [ https://hcupnet.

Link Between Perceived Body Weight and Smoking Behavior Among Adolescents.

Introduction: This study investigates a relationship between overweight perception and smoking among adolescents.

Methods: Data were retrieved from the Youth Risk Behavior Survey (YRBS), a biennial survey of a nationally representative sample of students in grades 9 through 12 in the United States. We analyze five waves of repeated cross-sections (N = 73 376) for the years 2005-2013.

The Association between Medicare Advantage Market Penetration and Diabetes in the United States.

The objective of this study is to explore the extent to which managed care market penetration in the United States is associated with the presence of chronic disease. Diabetes was selected as the chronic disease of interest due to its increasing prevalence as well as the disease management protocols that can lessen disease complications. We hypothesized that greater managed care market penetration would be associated with (1) lower prevalence of diabetes and (2) lower prevalence of diabetes-related comorbidities (DRCs) among diabetics.

Chronic Disease Prevalence and Medicare Advantage Market Penetration: Findings From the Medical Expenditure Panel Survey.

By March 2015, 30% of all Medicare beneficiaries were enrolled in Medicare Advantage (MA) plans. Research to date has not explored the impacts of MA market penetration on individual or population health outcomes. The primary objective of this study is to examine the relationships between MA market penetration and the beneficiary's portfolio of cardiometabolic diagnoses.

Oregon's experiment in health care delivery and payment reform: coordinated care organizations replacing managed care.

To control Medicaid costs, improve quality, and drive community engagement, the Oregon Health Authority introduced a new system of coordinated care organizations (CCOs). While CCOs resemble traditional Medicaid managed care, they have differences that have been deliberately designed to improve care coordination, increase accountability, and incorporate greater community governance. Reforms include global budgets integrating medical, behavioral, and oral health care and public health functions; risk-adjusted payments rewarding outcomes and evidence-based practice; increased transparency; and greater community engagement.

Oregon's coordinated care organizations: a promising and practical reform model.

Continuing its path of Medicaid program innovation, Oregon recently embarked on a major reform that gives regional coordinated care organizations (CCOs) global budgets and accountability for the physical, behavioral, and dental care of the state's Medicaid beneficiaries (Howard et al. 2014). There are some who maintain that the state's bold reform initiative is overly aggressive in scope and unrealistically optimistic in schedule and may prove to be a costly debacle to the state of Oregon.

Factors influencing maternal nutrition in rural Nepal: an exploratory research project.

In this pilot project we examined factors contributing to maternal nutrition among women of child-bearing age in the Western Region of Nepal. We found that rural women are interested in learning about nutrition regardless of educational attainment and that level of education is strongly associated with interest in learning about nutrition (p <.001).

The role of adverse physical health events on the utilization of mental health services.

Objective: To test the degree to which adverse physical health events may subsequently increase the utilization of mental health services.

Methods: A quasi-experimental pretest-posttest design was employed on a nationally representative sample of adults from the Medical Expenditure Panel Surveys for years 2004 and 2005. We constructed a 2-year balanced-panel dataset on 6,017 U.

Does the racial composition of the school environment influence children's body mass index?

Purpose: This study investigates the degree to which the racial composition of the school environment may influence the body mass index (BMI) of children aged 10 to 18 years. This research may be viewed as extending prior work that has found that the prevalence of risk behaviors among nonwhite adolescents is influenced by exposure to white adolescents.

Methods: This research used data from the Survey of Adults and Youth, which was conducted as part of the evaluation of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation's Urban Health Initiative.

The importance of team level tacit knowledge and related characteristics of high-performing health care teams.

Team level tacit knowledge is related to the collective knowledge of the team members. It is the shared experience that results in the ability to successfully anticipate the reactions of teammates in typical and nontypical situations. This study evaluates how tacit knowledge and related team characteristics influence the performance of cardiothoracic surgery teams.

Effect of increased ICU capacity on emergency department length of stay and ambulance diversion.

Study Objective: Lack of inpatient bed availability has been identified as a major contributor to emergency department (ED) crowding. Our objective is to determine the changes in ED length of stay and ambulance diversion occurring in an urban, academic medical center after an increase in adult ICU beds.

Methods: This was a secondary analysis of 2 years of hospital administrative data, capitalizing on a natural experiment in which the number of adult ICU beds in the study hospital increased from 47 to 67 (total beds 411 to 431).

The relationship between HAART use and employment for HIV-positive individuals: an empirical analysis and policy outlook.

Objective: This study jointly analyzes the determinants of the use of highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART) along with the determinants of employment status for human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)-positive individuals.

Methods: Data from the HIV Cost and Services Utilization Study (HCSUS) were analyzed using a bivariate probit model. HSCUS collected data on 2864 individuals in 180 clinics, hospitals and private practices in 28 urban areas and 24 clusters of rural counties in the United States.