Despite exclusion of cost from the definition of comparative effectiveness research from the recent health care reform legislation, it will feed into cost-benefit analyses.
The U.S. federal and state governments are taking steps to ameliorate the physician shortage by offering scholarship and loan-repayment options to medical students interested in primary care practice in designated underserved areas.
The Oxford Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine provides a scale for stratifying evidence from strongest to weakest on the basis of susceptibility to bias and the quality of study design.
International trade policies affect the distribution of life-saving medicine, the food market, and the migration of medical personnel from developing countries.
Strengthened NIH policies of inclusion have resulted in more NIH-funded research including more women and other underrepresented population groups as subjects in medical research.