Dictionary of Evidence-based Medicine.pdf

Dictionary of Evidence-based Medicine 105
Monetary policy
The policy adopted by a government and/or a country's central bank
(e.g. Federal Reserve in the USA and the Bank of England) with respect to
money supply and interest rates in order to control inflation rate and
employment.
Monopolistic competition
Monopolistic competition exists in a market when there are many sellers
and yet because of customer loyalty for example through brand loyalty,
they have some influence over prices. They are therefore able to make
some supernormal profits. This is in contrast to firms operating under pure
competition when they are all price takers or to a firm operating as a
monopoly or price setter.
Monopoly (see under Monopolistic competition)
Monopsony
A market situation where there is only one buyer. For example, in a
country with a comprehensive national health service, the market for
drugs is essentially monopsonistic. In contrast, a monopolistic market has
a single supplier. With both monopolies and monopsonies, competition is
imperfect and allocative efficiency is rare.
Monotonically related
Two variables are monotonically related if an increase in value in one
variable leads to an increase or stabilization in the value of the other and
vice versa. A monotonically increasing (decreasing) sequence is one in
which the next value is always greater (smaller) than the previous value.
Monte Carlo simulation
A method for random sampling from defined probability distributions.
Monte Carlo sampling is widely used for simulating physical systems such
as queues, spatial distributions and drug responses. The method is also
used for numerical integration, generally of complex functions which
cannot be handled analytically.