Debating Modern Medical Technologies

KAREN J. MASCHKE is Assistant Professor of Political Science at Oakland University in Rochester, Michigan. She teaches and writes in the areas of the judicial process, constitutional law, and women and the law.

This book analyzes policy fights about what counts as good evidence of safety and effectiveness when it comes to new health care technologies in the United States and what political decisions mean for patients and doctors.Medical technologies often promise to extend and improve quality of life but come with many questions: Are they safe and effective? Are they worth the cost? When should they be allowed on the market, and when should Medicare, Medicaid, and private insurance companies be required to pay for drugs, devices, and diagnostic tests? Using case studies of disputes about the value of mammography screening; genetic testing for disease risk; brain imaging technologies to detect biomarkers associated with Alzheimer's disease; cell-based therapies; and new, expensive drugs, Maschke and Gusmano illustrate how scientific disagreements about what counts as good evidence of safety and effectiveness are often swept up in partisan fights over health care reform and battles among insurance and health care companies, physicians, and patient advocates.Debating Modern Medical Technologies: The Politics of Safety, Effectiveness, and Patient Access reveals stakeholders' differing values and interests regarding patient choice, physician autonomy, risk assessment, government intervention in medicine and technology assessment, and scientific innovation as a driver of national and global economies. It will help readers to understand the nature and complexity of past and current policy disagreements and their effects on patients.

Connects to current political rhetoric about speeding up the availability of technology

AcknowledgmentsChapter 1 Evidence, Politics, and Medical Care TechnologyChapter 2 Evolving Public- and Private-Payer Approaches to Evidence and Health Technology AssessmentChapter 3 Mammography Screening: Vested Interests and PolarizationChapter 4 When Medicare Said No for Amyloid PET ImagingChapter 5 Placing a Value on Cure: Lessons from the New Generation of Hepatitis C DrugsChapter 6 Avastin and the Politics of Accelerated ApprovalChapter 7 The Path to the Clinic for Stem Cell and Other Regenerative Medicine InterventionsChapter 8 Conclusion: The 21st Century Cures Act and the Future of Health Technology AssessmentNotesBibliographyIndex