Socioeconomic Differences in the Adoption of New Medical Technologies
利用三项大型医疗调查，分析过去25年两类抗高血压药物（ACE抑制剂和钙通道阻滞剂）的短期和长期扩散情况，发现不同教育群体在药物采用上没有显著差异，表明社会经济地位差异并非健康梯度的重要原因。
New medical technologies hold tremendous promise for improving population health, but they also raise concerns about exacerbating already large differences in health by socioeconomic status (SES). If effective treatments are more rapidly adopted by the better educated, SES health disparities may initially expand even though the health of those in all groups eventually improves. Hypertension provides a useful case study. It is an important risk factor for developing cardiovascular disease, the condition is relatively common, and there are large differences in rates of hypertension by education. This paper examines the short and long-term diffusion of two important classes of anti-hypertensives - ACE inhibitors and calcium channel blockers - over the last twenty-five years. Using three prominent medical surveys, we find no evidence that the diffusion of these drugs into medical practice favored one education group relative to another. The findings suggest that - at least for hypertension - SES differences in the adoption of new medical technologies are not an important reason for the SES health gradient.