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Health care systems around the world
Health care systems around the world
Health care systems around the world
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I was very excited to have healthcare as the topic for my groups presentation, I’ve personally never had to deal with the logistics of healthcare or even needed to know how it worked. If I was sick I would go to the hospital or see a doctor and as long as they took my insurance, we were good to go. When we first started thinking about our topic as a group and the elements we wanted to add, we asked ourselves this: “What have we heard about healthcare but know nothing about?” the result was three main categories Medicare, Medicaid, and Obamacare. We assumed that as a group if we knew little about these topics, then there was a good chance no one in the class did either. Some of the things I found most interesting during the process of creating …show more content…
Some economists suggest that the market for healthcare is different from other competitive industries and therefore cannot act the same way. In principles, we learn the basic assumptions of a competitive market, (1) goods offered for sale are homogenous, (2) there must be many buyers and sellers so that each has a negligible impact on the market price and (3) For markets to work efficiently there can be no significant information failure affecting the decisions of the producers and consumers. In perfect competition, product’s must be homogeneous which means that goods that individual producers cannot alter or differentiate to collect a higher price. Health care is a heterogeneous product because the patient can experience a range of outcomes. There is an ongoing battle between hospitals and insurance companies. In theory, insurance companies negotiate with hospitals for a reduced rate. One of my favorites quotes I stumbled upon is from economist Uwe Reinhardt in regards to Obama and Obamacare “I wish I had a half hour with him to explain it to him. If you pit hundreds of little insurers against each other, what makes any one think that each of them has enough market clout to bargain successfully with a hospital? So I don 't think this public health plan, adding yet one more competitor, is going to bring costs down at …show more content…
Such as the notion of being “over covered”, studies show that 30% or more of U.S health care spending is on unnecessary care, since over-coverage reduces the cost of risky behaviors, such as unhealthy eating and smoking, people who are over covered have less incentives to make healthy lifestyle choices. Approximately 70% of all health care costs are directly related to personal behavior, costs that could have been prevented. Another interesting thing I learned was the idea that in the market for healthcare supply drives demand. In principles, we learned that as supply increased prices would fall. Title five of Obamacare talks about subsidizing education for healthcare workers, creating scholarships and loan repayment programs for physicians and nurses as well other healthcare professions. The government also tried this back in the 70’s with the idea that if there are more doctors there will be an incentive to lower the costs to compete for patients. This did not work out as expected, in healthcare supply drives demand, so when the supply increased, so did demand and, unfortunately so did the prices. When supply is high, doctors may lower their criteria for certain procedures, increasing the number of procedures done, as well as prescribe more visits to patients so that doctors continuously have
One of the most controversial topics in the United States in recent years has been the route which should be undertaken in overhauling the healthcare system for the millions of Americans who are currently uninsured. It is important to note that the goal of the Affordable Care Act is to make healthcare affordable; it provides low-cost, government-subsidized insurance options through the State Health Insurance Marketplace (Amadeo 1). Our current president, Barack Obama, made it one of his goals to bring healthcare to all Americans through the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010. This plan, which has been termed “Obamacare”, has come under scrutiny from many Americans, but has also received a large amount of support in turn for a variety of reasons. Some of these reasons include a decrease in insurance discrimination on the basis of health or gender and affordable healthcare coverage for the millions of uninsured. The opposition to this act has cited increased costs and debt accumulation, a reduction in employer healthcare coverage options, as well as a penalization of those already using private healthcare insurance.
The Affordable Care Act or “Obamacare” was designed to assure that all Americans regardless of health status have access to affordable health insurance. The Affordable Car Act was signed into law March 23, 2010. The primary goal of this act was to decrease barriers for obtaining health care coverage and allow Americans to access needed health care services (Affordable Care Act Summary, n.d). After the legislation is fully implemented in 2014, all Americans will be required to have health insurance through their employer, a public program such as Medicaid and/or Medicare or by purchasing insurance through the health insurance marketplace exchange (Affordable Care Act Summary, n.d). I will identify three parts of The Affordable Care Act that I believe are important. First, I will talk about the requirement that insurance companies are no longer able to deny coverage to individuals with pre-existing conditions. Secondly, I will explain why physician payments are being shifted to value over volume. Lastly, I will discuss Medicaid expansion and why some states are not expanding at all.
The current state of affairs in the development of health policy in the United States is that it is constantly in flux and its implementation is disorganized and inefficient. As was the case with the recently passed Affordable Care Act legislation, political and lobbying interests often intersect in a manner that makes meaningful, most appropriate changes unlikely. The ACA kept in place the fractured nature of American health care and insurance, and appears to have benefited insurance companies by increasing enrollments rather than making the care provided better on a large scale. The majority of the plans on the created exchanges, up to 87%, are funded by federal subsidies (Blumenthal, Abrams, & Nuzum, 2015). These plans must cover individuals regardless of pre-existing conditions. The burden of the cost of insurance shifted to tax-payers and the young/healthy who are now overly burdened with mandatory coverage that they may or may not need in
2.3 Explain how the health and social care practitioner own values, beliefs and experiences can influence delivery of care.
D1: I have decided to look at a 6 year old going through bereavement. Bereavement means to lose an individual very close to you. When children go through bereavement they are most likely to feel sad and upset about the person’s death. Children at a young age may not understand when a family member dies. Children may not understand bereavement. For example a 6 year old’s father been in a car crash and has died from that incident. Death is unpredictable and children can’t be prepared for a death of a family member as no one knows when someone is going to die or not. Unfortunately every child can experience bereavement even when a pet dies. It is important that we are aware that effects on the child so we can support them in the aftermath.
American people look at their insurance bills, co-pays and drug costs, and can't understand why they continue to increase. The insured should consider all of these reasons before getting upset. In 2004, employee health care premiums increased over 11 percent, four times more than the rate of inflation. In 2003, premiums rose 10.1 percent and in 2002 they rose 15 percent. Employee spending for coverage increased 126 percent between 2000 and 2004. Those increases were lower than expected. (National Coalition on Health Care, 2005, Facts on health care costs). Premiums have risen five times faster than workers wages, on average. If medical spending continues to rise by just two percent more than personal income, by 2040 Medicare and Medicaid would hit 18.5 percent of the gross domestic product, leading the federal deficit to be 20.7 of the gross domestic product. (Melcer, R., 2004, St Louis Post-Dispatch, Rising Costs of healthcare pose huge challenges).
Half of the 50 million people in the U.S are currently uninsured. The new healthcare laws were intended to expand health insurance coverage, but one trade association warned that it will end of driving 60 million manufacturing workers out of coverage supplied by their employers over the next decade unless it was fixed before that occurs.(Newton-Small). Companies offered health coverage to their employers but certain laws prevented them from giving some benefits, forcing them into something that is called a one sized fit's all system. Basically like a waiting list. The problem with the one sized fit all system is that healthcare is just simply too large and complexed to manage at a government level. This is a system the government created that they cannot fix. The charge of Obama care would dump 60 million workers into the laws state and federal insurance exchanges which lead to the Affordable Care Act (ACA). With the economy down, the ACA is far from being aff...
The Affordable Care Act, more commonly known as Obamacare, is a new health policy created by the American federal government. Its purpose is to make healthcare more affordable and friendly for the people. Unfortunately in some way that does not prove to be the case. It is becoming apparent that Obama may have made some misleading statements to help get the ACA put into action. The ACA is sprinkled with many flaws that call for a reform such as people’s current plans being terminated, high costs, and at minimum some people’s hours being cut by their employers.
6. The special characteristics of the U.S. health care market are Ethical and equity considerations, asymmetric information, spillover benefits, and third-party payments: insurance. Each one of these characteristics affects health care in some way. For example, ethical and equity considerations affect health care in the way that society does not consider unjust for people to be denied to health care access. Society believes that it is the same thing as not owning a car or a computer. Asymmetric information also gives health care a boost in prices. People who buy health care have no information on what procedures and diagnostics are involved, but on the other hand sellers do. This creates an unusual situation in which the doctor (seller) tells the patient(buyer) what services he or she should consume. It seems like the patient has to buy what the doctor tells him. The topic of spillover benefits also cause a rise in prices. This meaning that immunizations for diseases benefit not only the person who buys it but the whole community as well. It reduces the risk of the whole population getting infected. And the last characteristic is third-party insurance. Which involves all the insurance money people have to pay. This causes a distortion which results in excess consumption of health care services.
However, according to Jenna Flannigan, write at Healthline.com, America’s current for-profit system allows for competition between medical and pharmaceutical companies which drives prices up astronomically. “In countries where health insurance is government-run or nonprofit-run, there is no profit factor to drive up prices…For example, a typical bypass surgery in the Netherlands costs about $15,000 while in the United States it costs about $75,000” (Flannigan). This figure illustrates how the US’s needless competition between private, for-profit organizations make medical care unnecessarily unattainable to those who aren’t very affluent or do not have comprehensive medical care. These bloated prices do not even contribute to better care a majority of the time, as pointed out by political consultant Karin J. Robinson. “Here in Britain, for instance, we spend about 8% of the country's annual GDP on health care, compared to 15% in the US, and yet the overall health of the population is similar, with perhaps even a slight advantage for the UK” (Robinson). America’s current system is far more expensive, but for what reason? A healthcare system should be driven a will to help those in need, not for the personal gain of companies that are rife with greed. America needs to follow the path of other first-world nations and take a different approach to
Healthcare plays an important role in almost every person’s life at one point or another. Many times, one can get caught without, or underinsured and it can be detrimental to their livelihood. With the rising cost of healthcare, it is likely that having a national healthcare policy in place, and as an individual, being able to afford and obtain adequate health insurance has not been required until now. With the new national healthcare plan, it is required for all citizens to obtain and maintain some sort of public or private insurance policy. The rising costs can be attributed to many things. A significant reason for the astronomical cost of health care is because of the staggering amount of uninsured or underinsured individuals receiving medical attention and almost many never paying the bill. Those who do have insurance have seen a gradual increase in their premiums and deductibles to make up for this.
With the enactment of the Affordable Care Act, or Obamacare, it seems that the laws of supply and demand have changed since everybody is now mandated to have health insurance or pay a hefty fine to not have health insurance. With the “Health Insurance Exchange,” that also affects the economics of the situation as well, along with the price of everything. Since the Affordable Care Act has been enacted, the laws of supply and demand for insurance has changed drastically, and maybe not for the better.
To comprehend our current health care system, it is important to understand the history and how health care has evolved in the United States. The healthcare system we have now didn't always exist. Believe it or not, before 1920, most people would not of known what health care coverage meant! So how did the United States turn into one of the few developed countries lacking nationwide healthcare? Understanding U.S. healthcare history will help you understand the dynamics that built the system that, we struggle with today. Furthermore, I will make conclusions on the current problems we are facing.
The interdisciplinary course is a core requirement in the after-degree nursing program as it incorporates the principles of self-directed learning and promotes critical thinking, which is an essential element in nursing practice. As a final year nursing student, I believe that knowledge from this course will enhance my ability to provide patient-centered care.
The cost of US health care has been steadily increasing for many years causing many Americans to face difficult choices between health care and other priorities in their lives. Health economists are bringing to light the tradeoffs which must be considered in every healthcare decision (Getzen, 2013, p. 427). Therefore, efforts must be made to incite change which constrains the cost of health care without creating adverse health consequences. As the medical field becomes more business oriented, there will be more of a shift in focus toward the costs and benefits, which will make medicine more like the rest of the economy (Getzen, 2013, p. 439).