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Often linked to the New Public Management (NPM) doctrines, agencification has been on the priority list of policy makers for over two decades. This article proposes an analysis of the role of agencies in the French health system and the impact of government agency reform on physicians and the public.

The research analyzes the perceived implementation of a re-concentration of decision-making powers within public agencies as the declared goal of agencification at the French health care system, specifically primary care providers and hospitals. The assessment relies on secondary sources from ministerial bodies such as the Ministry of Health and Social Affairs, the Ministry of Labor, the Social Security and the General Accounting Office, and specialized French technical agencies.

Decentralization in France and the subsequent rise of public health care agencies had outcomes below expectations. Hence, a re-concentration of decision-making powers within the larger Regional Health Agencies; a streamlining of the public administration; and a re-appropriation of decision-making powers by the Ministry of Health are needed. The monitoring of health providers allows central health authorities to govern at a distance.

The analysis of health care agencies in France and of their use of efficiency-enhancing techniques may trigger a change of values within the medical profession.

In the USA, health maintenance organizations (HMOs) have pledged to control health care costs. Many patients have complained about the quality of care under the HMO regime and limits imposed on them, particularly access to care. Has quality of care been degraded under the HMO regime, resulting in an impact on patient satisfaction? There have been many studies that have compared the satisfaction of HMO patients with that of patients in the traditional fee‐for‐service payment system. The aim of this paper is to review HMO patient satisfaction.

A review of patient satisfaction under managed care arrangements with a focus on HMOs. The article describes the US history of managed care and its effect on the satisfaction of several patient categories including the general population, vulnerable patients and the elderly.

There is much information available on patient satisfaction with their insurers and most surveys indicate the lack of choice of a provider – a major source of discontent. Therefore, patient protection laws are necessary to avoid abuse.

Patients have little ability or are not willing to rely on the information available when selecting a provider. The paper discusses patient awareness regarding satisfaction surveys and how the latter can be used when patients are seeking care.

This paper aims to analyse health reforms carried out in a sample of European countries.

Using a country‐specific approach, outstanding health reform features such as: greater competition between sickness funds in Germany; fund‐holding practices in the UK; managed care models in Switzerland; health networks in France; and healthcare system decentralisation in Italy are analysed.

There have been different approaches to controlling healthcare costs. Some states relied on public sector competition by creating quasi‐markets (UK), insurance sector competition, particularly in Switzerland and Germany, organisational reforms in France by creating health networks and decentralisation in Italy.

Societal and legal aspects are not discussed.

The paper compares healthcare reform effectiveness in a number of western European countries.

This paper aims to review the vertical or quasi‐vertical integration that characterized the pharmaceutical industry in the mid‐1990s. The acquisitions and vertical partnerships that linked pharmacy benefits managers and drug manufacturers modified the structure of the market at that time. What were the motivations of those agreements? Did they induce any distortion on competition in the drug market? And why did they fail to achieve their desired strategic advantages?

The paper uses established theoretical perspectives, such as the resource‐based view and the theory of contestable markets, as the basis for a descriptive analysis, documenting strategic decisions of vertical integration using supporting literature in marketing and strategy.

Vertical integration did not obtain the intended results (e.g. acquisition of competitive advantages). This perspective provides a framework to examine vertical integration strategies, applicable to other industries.

The paper reviews the objectives of vertical integration strategies of US drug firms in the 1990s and their hidden agendas.