Customer Reviews

Changing the U.S. Health Care System: Key Issues in Health Services Policy and Management (Jossey Bass/Aha Press Series)

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As I work for a health insurance company, I felt that I would benefit from reading Changing the U.S. Health Care System: Key Issues in Health Services Policy and Management by Ronald M. Andersen, Thomas H. Rice, and Gerald F. Kominski. Unfortunately, it was not what I was expecting. I was hoping for opinions and options on reforming health care. What I found was numerous stats, a lot of issues, and not too many answers.

Contents:
Part 1 - Access To Health Care: Improving Access to Care in America - Individual and Contextual Indicators; Ethnic Disparities in Health Status; Disparities in Health Care; Public Policies to Extend Health Care Coverage
Part 2 - Costs of Health Care: Measuring Health Care Costs and Trends; Containing Health Care Costs; Controlling Pharmaceutical Prices and Expenditures
Part 3 - Quality Of Health Care: Measuring Outcomes and Health-Related Quality of Life; Evaluating the Quality of Care; Public Release of Information on Quality; Health Care Information Systems; Performance Measurement of Nursing Care
Part 4 - Special Populations: Long-Term Care and the Elderly Population; AIDS in the Twenty-First Century - Challenges for Health Services and Public Health; Health Reform for Children and Families; Mental Health Services and Policy Issues; Women's Health - Key Issues in Access to Health Insurance Coverage and to Services Among Nonelderly Women; Homeless Persons
Part 5 - Directions for Change: Managed Care and the Growth of Competition; Medicare Reform; Public Health and Personal Health Services; The Continuing Issue of Medical Malpractice Liability; Ethical Issues in Public Health and Health Services
Index

I believe that most people would agree that the health care system in America is broken. Changes have to be made, as rising rates are making it harder for people to find affordable health care coverage. What I was hoping for in this book was a number of serious discussions on different approaches such as universal care, single-payer systems, etc. The chapters in the book are all written by a number of different people, making it a compilation of sorts. Nearly all the chapters go deeply into statistics and numbers, showing how population group x is affected by disease y in z percentages. From the standpoint of policymakers or actuarials, these numbers are necessary to know the extent of the problem. But I felt as if most of the discussion stopped there. Many issues were raised, and nearly any hint of a solution was watered down with all the reasons why it might not work or have the opposite effect of what was intended. Some of the sections were more informational than others, such as the chapter on Medicare reform. Learning the history of how Medicare came about, as well as under what assumptions, makes it easier to understand why the system functions as it does. But again, everything ended on a note of "things need to change", but not much was offered as an alternative...

Readers who need a heavy statistical or academic look at health care issues will find it here. People like myself who are more practical in nature will find the material rather plodding and dry. My overall conclusion after reading this was that there are no easy answers, and any solution will significantly hurt some portion of the current system. There's not enough money and resources for everyone to have unlimited access to the best health care available. And for a society that's used to immediate gratification, that'll be a hard sell...

Very good condition, interesting information better to use as a refernce then actually reading through from start to finish.

Unfortunately, I never received this book from the Storage Chest... maybe it's still in storage?! My card was charged $42.48... now I am "out" for that amount! When I went to track the order with the order #, it stated that no such order could be located. I tried 3 times to track it. I ordered the book on August 30, 2010 with an expected delivery date of September 22, 2010. I would like to be refunded. I have never had this problem before, and I hope that I don't in the future. Fortunately, I have been doing OK in my class without the book! (Going on line for certain chapters.)

-With Regrets
Debbie