“Too much medicine”: Insights and explanations from economic theory and research

Martin Hensher, John Tisdell and Craig Zimitat

Social Science & Medicine, 2017, vol. 176, issue C, 77-84

Abstract: Increasing attention has been paid in recent years to the problem of “too much medicine”, whereby patients receive unnecessary investigations and treatments providing them with little or no benefit, but which expose them to risks of harm. Despite this phenomenon potentially constituting an inefficient use of health care resources, it has received limited direct attention from health economists.

Keywords: Too much medicine; Health care overconsumption; Overtreatment; Overdiagnosis; Health economics; Behavioural economics; Ecological economics (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2017
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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DOI: 10.1016/j.socscimed.2017.01.020

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