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Children's Dental Services Under the Medicaid Program

Description: The report discusses the oral health of children eligible for Medicaid, the House Committee on Energy and Commerce and its Subcommittee on Health and the Environment requested OTA to determine whether children eligible for Medicaid are provided at least a minimum level of dental care. This study compares the dental manuals of seven State Medicaid programs with a set of “basic’ dental services (which comprise shared components of various well-accepted dental guidelines) to see if States allow th… more
Date: September 1990
Creator: United States. Congress. Office of Technology Assessment.
Partner: UNT Libraries Government Documents Department
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Computer Software and Intellectual Property

Description: This background paper examines existing intellectual-property protection for computer software-copyrights, patents, and trade secrets—and provides an overview of the often conflicting views and concerns of various stakeholders. It was prepared in response to a request from the Subcommittee on Courts, Intellectual Property, and the Administration of Justice of the House Committee on the Judiciary.
Date: March 1990
Creator: United States. Congress. Office of Technology Assessment.
Partner: UNT Libraries Government Documents Department
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Confused Minds, Burdened Families: Finding Help for People With Alzheimer's and Other Dementias

Description: This OTA report analyzes the problem of locating and arranging services for people with dementia, presents a framework for an effective system to connect them to appropriate services, and discusses congressional policy options for establishing such a system. One of the main policy issues is whether the system should serve people with dementia exclusively or serve people with other diseases and conditions as well.
Date: July 1990
Creator: United States. Congress. Office of Technology Assessment.
Partner: UNT Libraries Government Documents Department
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Coping With an Oiled Sea

Description: In the aftermath of the Exxon Valdez oil spill in Alaska in March, 1989, a myriad of investigations were initiated to evaluate the causes of that accident and to propose remedies. The Office of Technology Assessment was asked to study the Nation’s oil spill clean-up capabilities and to assess the technologies for responding to such catastrophic spills in the future.
Date: March 1990
Creator: United States. Congress. Office of Technology Assessment.
Partner: UNT Libraries Government Documents Department
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Forest Service Planning: Setting Strategic Direction Under RPA

Description: This report evaluates past RPA efforts, reviews the process used by the Forest Service in preparing the 1989 RPA Assessment and the Draft 1990 RPA Program, and identities options for improving RPA’s contribution to long-range planning and to policy and budget deliberations. The second OTA report on Forest Service planning will review national forest planning, and will examine the relationship between national planning under RPA and forest planning under NFMA.
Date: July 1990
Creator: United States. Congress. Office of Technology Assessment.
Partner: UNT Libraries Government Documents Department
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Health Care in Rural America

Description: This report is about access of people in rural America to basic health care services. This report focuses on trends in the availability of primary and acute health care in rural areas and factors affecting those trends.
Date: September 1990
Creator: United States. Congress. Office of Technology Assessment.
Partner: UNT Libraries Government Documents Department
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High-Temperature Superconductivity in Perspective

Description: This is the second of two OTA assessments on the subject of high-temperature superconductivity (HTS). As the title suggests, this study attempts to put HTS in perspective, both in terms of competing technologies (e.g., the more mature low-temperature superconductors), and in terms of the many technical and economic problems that must be overcome before HTS can be widely used.
Date: April 1990
Creator: United States. Congress. Office of Technology Assessment.
Partner: UNT Libraries Government Documents Department
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Holding the Edge: Maintaining the Defense Technology Base—Vol. II, Appendices

Description: The report notes that America’s defense technology base has weathered significantly, with challenges to U.S. high-Technology firms from abroad, increasing dependence on foreign and civilian sources of technology for use in military systems, and growing technological sophistication of our adversaries.
Date: January 1990
Creator: United States. Congress. Office of Technology Assessment.
Partner: UNT Libraries Government Documents Department
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Making Things Better: Competing in Manufacturing

Description: This report considers ways to promote the restoration of American leadership in manufacturing technology. Some of the things that most need doing are up to industry— especially in handling people, from managers to engineers to shopfloor workers, and in forming stable, productive relationships between different segments of an industry complex. Government also has a critical role to play.
Date: February 1990
Creator: United States. Congress. Office of Technology Assessment.
Partner: UNT Libraries Government Documents Department
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Paying the Bill: Manufacturing and America's Trade Deficit

Description: This special report analyzes the causes of the deterioration in America’s trade performance and examines the importance of U.S. manufacturing in helping the nation improve its position in international trade. The report was requested by Senator John Heinz as part of an assessment of technology, innovation and U.S. trade requested by the Senate Committee on Finance; the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs; and the House Committee on Banking, Finance and Urban Affairs. A final … more
Date: June 1988
Creator: United States. Congress. Office of Technology Assessment.
Partner: UNT Libraries Government Documents Department
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Pesticide Residues in Food: Technologies for Detection

Description: Federal monitoring and enforcement action is dependent on technical capability to detect pesticides. A major concern is that Federal regulatory agencies cannot practically monitor food for all pesticides of health concern. OTA was asked to assess whether existing and emerging technologies could improve Federal monitoring of pesticide residues in food. In addition, OTA examined the Federal research programs dedicated to improving Federal analytical capabilities for the detection of pesticides in… more
Date: October 1988
Creator: United States. Congress. Office of Technology Assessment.
Partner: UNT Libraries Government Documents Department
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Power On! New Tools for Teaching and Learning

Description: This report examines developments in the use of computer-based technologies, analyzes key trends in hardware and software development, evaluates the capability of technology to improve learning in many areas, and explores ways to substantially increase student access to technology. The role of the teacher, teachers’ needs for training, and the impact of Federal support for educational technology research and development are reviewed as well.
Date: September 1988
Creator: United States. Congress. Office of Technology Assessment.
Partner: UNT Libraries Government Documents Department
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The Quality of Medical Care: Information for Consumers

Description: Changes in how physicians and hospitals are paid have made individual consumers, health insurers, employers, and medical providers more sensitive to the cost implications of their decisions. At the same time, these policy changes have elevated the importance of having consumers be informed about the quality of medical providers. Purchasers of medical care (individual consumers, employers, health insurers) need to know about any differences in quality so that they can weigh quality along with co… more
Date: June 1988
Creator: United States. Congress. Office of Technology Assessment.
Partner: UNT Libraries Government Documents Department
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Reducing Launch Operation Costs: New Technologies and Practices

Description: This technical memorandum explains, the United States has spent relatively little effort in applying them to operations. Just as important as cost saving technologies are appropriate management methods, or strategies, to put these technologies to work. In some cases, OTA has found, cost savings could be achieved by streamlining operations and reducing the burden of documentation and reporting requirements that have slowly expanded over the years.
Date: September 1988
Creator: United States. Congress. Office of Technology Assessment.
Partner: UNT Libraries Government Documents Department
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Safe Skies for Tomorrow: Aviation Safety in a Competitive Environment

Description: This report contains the results of that analysis, and a review of critical management issues for the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has been added to the basic questions about the adequacy of Federal standards and programs. During the course of the study, it became clear that a full report for Congress would have to consider how policy is determined and implemented, and thus the operation of FAA and the role of the Department of Transportation.
Date: July 1988
Creator: United States. Congress. Office of Technology Assessment.
Partner: UNT Libraries Government Documents Department
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Science, Technology, and the First Amendment: special report

Description: Part I of the report discusses how the meaning of “the press” has expanded from printed material to include a wide range of broadcast and electronic media. Satellites, computers, electronic bulletin boards, teletex, videotext, and other new ways of gathering, editing, and delivering news are blurring legal and regulatory distinctions between common carriers and “the press, ” thus changing arguments about the constitutional rights that they have each enjoyed. Part II addresses freedom of speech … more
Date: January 1988
Creator: United States. Congress. Office of Technology Assessment.
Partner: UNT Libraries Government Documents Department
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Screening for Open-Angle Glaucoma in the Elderly

Description: A report on open-angle glaucoma (OAG), whcich is the second largest single cause of blindness in the elderly, afflicting an estimated 2 to 3 percent of this age group at any time. the report discusses epidemiology of OAG, treatment, screening technology available, and medicare coverage for OAG.
Date: October 1988
Creator: Power, Elaine J.; Wagner, Judith L. & Duffy, Brigitte M.
Partner: UNT Libraries Government Documents Department
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The Impact of AIDS on the Kaiser Permanente Medical Care Program (Northern California Region)

Description: The topic of this fourth paper in OTA’S series of AIDS-related issues is the impact of the AIDS epidemic on the Kaiser Permanence Medical Care Program’s (KPMCP) northern California region and was originally commissioned for OTA’s assessment of Medical Testing and Health Insurance. Key OTA staff involved in the oversight of the project were Jill Eden, Larry Miike, and Laurie Mount.
Date: July 1988
Creator: Hiatt, Robert A.; Fireman, Bruce; Quesenberry, Charles P., Jr. & Selby, Joseph V.
Partner: UNT Libraries Government Documents Department
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Infertility: Medical and Social Choices

Description: This report illustrates a range of options for congressional action in nine principal areas of public policy related to infertility: collecting data on reproductive health; preventing infertility; information to inform and protect consumers; providing access to infertility services; reproductive health of veterans; transfer of human eggs, sperm, and embryos; recordkeeping; surrogate motherhood; and reproductive research.
Date: May 1988
Creator: United States. Congress. Office of Technology Assessment.
Partner: UNT Libraries Government Documents Department
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Informing the Nation: Federal Information Dissemination in an Electronic Age

Description: This report addresses the opportunities to improve the dissemination of Federal information. It also highlights two major problems: maintaining equity in public access to Federal information in electronic formats, and defining the respective roles of Federal agencies and the private sector in the electronic dissemination process. The report focuses on current and future roles of the U.S. Government Printing Office (GPO) and Superintendent of Documents, the Depository Library Program (administer… more
Date: October 1988
Creator: United States. Congress. Office of Technology Assessment.
Partner: UNT Libraries Government Documents Department
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Institutional Protocols for Decisions About Life-Sustaining Treatments: special report

Description: This report focuses on the formal policies and guidelines’ through which health care institutions articulate decision making procedures and identify permissible options regarding the use of life-sustaining treatments for adult patients in their care.
Date: July 1988
Creator: United States. Congress. Office of Technology Assessment.
Partner: UNT Libraries Government Documents Department
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Launch Options for the Future: : special report

Description: Adequate, reliable space transportation is the key to this Nation’s future in space. Over the next several years, Congress must make critical decisions regarding the direction and funding of U.S. space transportation systems. These decisions include improving existing launch systems, designing and procuring new launch systems, and developing advanced technologies. America’s constrained budgetary environment and the lack of a national consensus about the future of the U.S. space program make Con… more
Date: July 1988
Creator: United States. Congress. Office of Technology Assessment.
Partner: UNT Libraries Government Documents Department
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Mapping Our Genes—Genome Projects: How Big? How Fast?

Description: Scientific and technical journals in biology and medicine have extensively covered a debate about whether and how to determine the function and order of human genes on human chromosomes and when to determine the sequence of molecular building blocks that comprise DNA in those chromosomes. This report surveys the points made so far in the debate that involves science, technology, and politics, focusing on those that most directly influence the policy options facing the U.S. Congress.
Date: April 1988
Creator: United States. Congress. Office of Technology Assessment.
Partner: UNT Libraries Government Documents Department
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Medical Testing and Health Insurance

Description: Tests to identify individuals who are likely to develop serious diseases are being rapidly developed. Some of these tests are directed at diseases for which there are presently no known therapies, thereby raising questions over the social consequences of identifying susceptible persons. This assessment examines existing and developing medical tests and their current and potential uses by health insurers and employers.
Date: August 1988
Creator: United States. Congress. Office of Technology Assessment.
Partner: UNT Libraries Government Documents Department
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