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The Allocation of Preventive Resources in South Carolina: Assessing the Efficiency, Equity and Distribution
David M. Ward, PhD
College of Health Professions
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Specific Aims:
- Develop an algorithm for gain in years of life from prevention services
- Develop a county-level model to map gain in life years form preventive services
- Share information with policy makers
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| Mathematical models can be used by decision makers to ensure that resources (frequently involving large sums of taxpayer or corporation money) are spent so that the most benefit is gained. In health care, one measure for the gain is the number of "quality adjusted" years of life added by the service on which the resources are spent. Decisions are often more complicated than simple cost and benefit comparisons because issues of politics, ethics, and legalities must be addressed. Dr. Ward and his colleagues will develop a mathematical model to estimate the gain in life years that would result from spending differing amounts of resources on disease prevention programs. Then they will use South Carolina county population data on age, gender, and race to assess the distributional effects (if everyone gets the same or some people get more than others) of varying factors such as changing the amount of funding, allocating funding based on age or race, equalizing funding across counties, and other ethical, legal, or political constraints. These models will be shared with South Carolina lawmakers and others to help in future decision making. The evaluation assesses the degree to which data were used to change programs or policies. |
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