Analytic and approximate solutions for the energy eigenvalues generated by a
confined softcore Coulomb potentials of the form a/(r+\beta) in d>1 dimensions
are constructed. The confinement is effected by linear and harmonic-oscillator
potential terms, and also through `hard confinement' by means of an
impenetrable spherical box. A byproduct of this work is the construction of
polynomial solutions for a number of linear differential equations with
polynomial coefficients, along with the necessary and sufficient conditions for
the existence of such solutions. Very accurate approximate solutions for the
general problem with arbitrary potential parameters are found by use of the
asymptotic iteration method.Comment: 17 pages, 2 figure
