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The principle of distributing health care according to medical need is being challenged by increasing costs. As a result, many countries have initiated a debate on the introduction of explicit priority regulations based on medical, economic and person-based criteria, or have already established such regulations. Previous research on individual attitudes towards setting health care priorities based on medical and economic criteria has revealed consistent results, whereas studies on the use of person-based criteria have generated controversial findings. This paper examines citizens’ attitudes towards three person-based priority criteria, patients’ smoking habits, age and being the parent of a young child. Using data from the ISSP Health Module (2011) in 28 countries, logistic regression analysis demonstrates that self-interest as well as socio-demographic predictors significantly influence respondents’ attitudes towards the use of person-based criteria for health care prioritization. This study contributes to resolving the controversial findings on person-based criteria by using a larger country sample and by controlling for country-level differences with fixed effects models. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this thoughtful paper, Mechanic discusses the differences between quantitative and qualitative researchers, focusing on health-related issues. It should, of course, be evident to readers that the issues he discusses have applicability far beyond medical sociology. The same issues arise in all kinds of social research and the excellent examples he gives can be expanded easily to examples in areas including education, criminology, industrial relations, social stratification, and others. In my reading of his paper, Mechanic discusses both differences between methods at a single point in time and differences in measuring process across time. As a quantitative survey researcher, I will comment on my perceptions of the similarities and differences between observational and survey methods for cross-sectional research. I then discuss some methods for bridging the gap that do not involve diaries. Finally, I discuss procedures for measuring process using observational and diary methods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]