TOPIC
The course reviews the theory and practice of the economic assessment of health care technologies and related programs. Students will learn various approaches to estimating costs and benefits in the healthcare setting. The course will also discuss quality of life measurement and the construction of quality-adjusted-life-years. Through lab sessions, students will learn how to perform basic cost-effectiveness analyses using Treeage decision analysis software. A particular emphasis will be placed on applications to clinical and public policy.

AUDIENCE
This short course is targeted at researchers from the social and behavioral sciences and medicine who are interested in medical technology and program evaluation. The course will assume the participant has a basic understanding of algebra and probability theory.

INSTRUCTOR
Joshua Graff Zivin is an associate professor of economics in the Department of Health Policy and Management and a senior research associate at the International Center for Health Outcomes and Innovation Research at Columbia University. He is also a Faculty Research Fellow at the National Bureau of Economic Research. In 2004-2005, he served as a senior economist on the White House Council of Economic Advisers.

Professor Graff Zivin's research spans four broad thematic areas – medical technology, medical care, health insurance, and public health / environmental economics – and focuses on how uncertainty and heterogeneity affect both individual and societal decision-making. Specific research projects in the environmental / public health arena have addressed corporate incentives for environmental over-compliance; use of liability rules to manage stochastic pollution problems; taxation of pollution; the use of targeted policies for achieving environmental health objectives; and occupational safety regulations. His research on health care has examined the adoption of medical technologies by risk-averse agents; medical innovation under uncertainty; health care transactions characterized by imperfect information; and individual incentives to obtain health insurance. More recently he has turned his attention to the economic impacts of the AIDS crisis in Africa.

REQUIRED READING
Drummond, MF and Mooney, GH. The Essentials of Health Economics, Part V. British Medical Journal, Volume 285, November 27, 1982: 561-563.

Ganiats, T. Cost-Effectiveness Analysis. Medical Decision Making. 1995; 22(2): 307-318.

Weinstein, M and W Stason. Foundations of Cost-Effectiveness Analysis for Health and Medical Practices.The New England Journal of Medicine. March 31, 1977: 716-721

To register
This short course is open free of charge to faculty, postdoctoral fellows, and graduate students at Columbia University as well as faculty and postdoctoral fellows at other sites of the Robert Wood Johnson Health & Society Scholars (H&SS) Program. Enrollment is limited to 20; H&SS affiliates will have priority.

To register, please send an email to: chssp@columbia.edu. Please include your mailing address, as readings will be sent to course participants. Also, include a few sentences

The Health & Society Scholars Program at Columbia University is a postdoctoral program funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. It is a joint initiative of the Mailman School of Public Health and the Institute for Social and Economic Research and Policy (ISERP) at Columbia, and is co-directed by Bruce Link and Peter Bearman. For more information call 212-854-3694 or email chssp@columbia.edu