The need for evidence-based health policy to address health care variations

Abstract

Medicare policy making now deals mostly with price-setting issues. However, as Warren Buffet has noted: "Price is what you pay. Value is what you get." Victor Fuchs's studies raise fundamental issues for a value-oriented Medicare program. Florida offers one of many regional patterns of Medicare mortality that are not yet adequately explained. Valued-oriented, evidence-based Medicare policies would target opportunities to improve population health and would foster greater use of evidence-based medicine.