Effectiveness of care and improvement of quality of life in patients with panic disorder

To investigate how practice guidelines or recommendations can be applied in the assessment of quality of care, 72 subjects beginning specialty treatment for panic disorder were enrolled. The Panic Outcomes Module assessed symptoms, health status, and treatment at baseline and after 8 weeks. Using published guidelines, the authors developed specific criteria to rate whether subjects' reports reflected appropriate treatment, including antipanic medication or three or more subsequent visits that involved antipanic behavioral therapy elements. Sixty-nine subjects (96%) completed the Panic Outcomes Module at both baseline and follow-up. Improvement in symptoms and health status was not different between subjects receiving appropriate and inappropriate care.     

Bargaining Experiments With Deadlines and Random Delays

In many bargaining environments there are random delays in the transmission of proposals. Two computerized bargaining experiments are designed to study behavior with this condition. A clock starts counting down from three minutes when the first offer is sent. In one experiment the clock is not stopped once the bargaining begins; in the other it is paused during the time an agent thinks about a counteroffer. All proposals are randomly delayed. Results are compared to a control design with no such delays. Delays create a first mover advantage, and agreements are more uniformly spread across a bargaining period.     

Child protection and research: understanding the messages

This paper contributes to the debate which has followed publication of the recent Department of Health research in child protection. From the viewpoint of one of the researchers, it surveys the criticisms presented by Nigel Parton (Parton 19%). It suggests that the problems he identifies are not irresolvable, and that improve-ments in social work policy and practice are feasible, as long as the stance taken by the researchers is correctly understood.     

Health effects of child work: Evidence from rural Vietnam

We test whether work in childhood impacts on health. We focus on agricultural work, the dominant form of child work worldwide. Data are from the Vietnam Living Standards Survey, 1992–93 and 1997–98. We correct for both unobservable heterogeneity and simultaneity biases. Instruments are land holdings and commune labour market and school quality indicators. We examine three indicators of health: weight-for-age Z-score; reported illness; and, height growth. There is clear evidence of a healthy worker selection effect. We find little evidence of a contemporaneous negative impact of child work on health but, particularly for females, work undertaken during childhood raises the risk of illness up to five years later. For boys, the risk is increasing with the period of time in work. There is no evidence that work impedes the growth of the child. This work was undertaken as part of the Understanding Children's Work project, an inter-agency program between the International Labour Organisation, UNICEF and the World Bank. The views expressed are those of the authors alone and do not reflect positions of the sponsoring organisations. We are grateful to the Government of Vietnam for permission to use the data. We thank two referees for very helpful comments. Responsible editor: Alessandro Cigno.