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Health Care in the United States, System Dynamics Applications to

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Encyclopedia of Complexity and Systems Science

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Definition of the Subject

Health care involves a complex system of interactions among patients, providers, payers, and other stakeholders. This system is difficult tomanage in the United States because of its free market approach and relative lack of regulation. System Dynamics simulation modeling is an effectivemethod for understanding and explaining causes of dysfunction in U.S. health care and for suggesting approaches to improving health outcomes and slowingrising costs. Applications since the 1970s have covered diverse areas in health care including the epidemiology of diseases and substance abuse, as wellas the dynamics of health care capacity and delivery and their impacts on health. Many of these applications have dealt with the mounting burden ofchronic illnesses, such as diabetes. In this article four such applications are described.

Introduction

Despite remarkable successes in some areas, the health enterprise in the United States faces difficult challenges in meeting its...

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Abbreviations

Chronic illness :

A disease or adverse health state that persists over time and cannot in general be cured, although its symptoms may be treatable.

Stock:

An accumulation or state variable, such as the size of a population.

Flow:

A rate-of‐change variable affecting a stock, such as births flowing into a population or deaths flowing out.

Feedback loop:

A closed loop of causality that acts to counterbalance or reinforce prior change in a system state.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Independent Consultant, Wayland, USA

    Gary Hirsch

  2. Independent Consultant, Voorhees, USA

    Jack Homer

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  1. Gary Hirsch
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. RAMTECH LIMITED, 122 Escalle Lane, Larkspur, CA, 94939, USA

    Robert A. Meyers Ph. D. (Editor-in-Chief) (Editor-in-Chief)

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Hirsch, G., Homer, J. (2009). Health Care in the United States, System Dynamics Applications to. In: Meyers, R. (eds) Encyclopedia of Complexity and Systems Science. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-30440-3_270

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