3 ms·

I wish that there was a calculator out there that would allow you to build your own healthcare system, so to speak. You could tweak attributes such as funding m

by jdhn 9y ago

I wish that there was a calculator out there that would allow you to build your own healthcare system, so to speak. You could tweak attributes such as funding mechanisms, etc. I imagine this hypothetical calculator could function like this [0]. [0] http://www.crfb.org/debtfixer/ http://www.crfb.org/debtfixer/

randcraw 9y ago
Yes, this is very much a multivariable optimization. For comparison of healthcare systems, it'd help to choose a common set of N disease therapies and services, then assess each for outcome and cost applied across perhaps three economic tiers of the public: zero, middle, and upper incomes. I'd also like to know what protection each system provides against personal bankruptcy. And which system allows life saving therapy for those .01 percenters for whom a cure is available but extremely expensive or inconvenient (e.g. hepatitis C vaccine or CAR-T therapy). At what percentiles are those lines drawn? How to the programs compare? (For example, I have the sense that Canada disallows a larger fraction of expensive treatments and delays treatments longer than most other systems, especially near end of life.)
maxerickson 9y ago
Is it possible? For instance, say you choose to block grant Medicaid to states (a frequent proposal this year). Those block grants are a significant reduction compared to projected spending under current law. But if states are individually deciding how to deal with reductions and what to do with the funds they do continue to receive, how do you assess the outcome of that policy decision? And then how do you put that on a slider widget?
smacktoward 9y ago
Maxis (the SimCity people) made such a thing as a game 20 years ago: SimHealth (https://obscuritory.com/sim/simhealth/ https://obscuritory.com/sim/simhealth/). It's long out of print, but (ahem) I imagine you could download a copy that would run fine under DOSBox if you looked on the right Web sites. Hypothetically speaking, I mean.

by jdhn 9y ago

randcraw 9y ago

Yes, this is very much a multivariable optimization. For comparison of healthcare systems, it'd help to choose a common set of N disease therapies and services, then assess each for outcome and cost applied across perhaps three economic tiers of the public: zero, middle, and upper incomes. I'd also like to know what protection each system provides against personal bankruptcy. And which system allows life saving therapy for those .01 percenters for whom a cure is available but extremely expensive or inconvenient (e.g. hepatitis C vaccine or CAR-T therapy). At what percentiles are those lines drawn? How to the programs compare? (For example, I have the sense that Canada disallows a larger fraction of expensive treatments and delays treatments longer than most other systems, especially near end of life.)

maxerickson 9y ago

Is it possible? For instance, say you choose to block grant Medicaid to states (a frequent proposal this year). Those block grants are a significant reduction compared to projected spending under current law. But if states are individually deciding how to deal with reductions and what to do with the funds they do continue to receive, how do you assess the outcome of that policy decision? And then how do you put that on a slider widget?

smacktoward 9y ago

Maxis (the SimCity people) made such a thing as a game 20 years ago: SimHealth (https://obscuritory.com/sim/simhealth/ https://obscuritory.com/sim/simhealth/). It's long out of print, but (ahem) I imagine you could download a copy that would run fine under DOSBox if you looked on the right Web sites. Hypothetically speaking, I mean.