Custom made versus ready to wear treatments :
behavioral propensities in physician's choices /
Richard G. Frank, Richard J. Zeckhauser.

Description

Main Author

Frank, Richard G.

Related Names

Zeckhauser, Richard.
National Bureau of Economic Research.

Language(s)

English

Published

Cambridge, Mass. : National Bureau of Economic Research, c2007.

Subjects

Social medicine.
Physician and patient.
Physicians > Physicians / Attitudes.
Physicians > Physicians / Decision making.
Medical care > Medical care / Decision making.

Summary

To customize treatments to individual patients entails costs of coordination and cognition. Thus, providers sometimes choose treatments based on norms for broad classes of patients. We develop behavioral hypotheses explaining when and why doctors customize to the particular patient, and when instead they employ "ready-to-wear" treatments. Our empirical studies examining length of office visits and physician prescribing behavior find evidence of norm-following behavior. Some such behavior, from our studies and from the literature, proves sensible; but other behavior seems far from optimal.

Note

"September 2007."
Also available in PDF from the NBER World Wide Web site (www.nber.org).

Physical Description

56 p. : ill. ; 22 cm.

Locate a Print Version

Find in a library

Viewability