Mired in the Morass describes a predicament known to almost 47 million Americans: paying for medical bills without health insurance. Neil Davis navigated this financial black hole and discovered a hidden truth: medical bills don't reflect the costs of medicine. Davis describes the harrowing journey his family took in paying for cancer treatments, and comes to the well-informed conclusion that our health care system is broken, and doesn't have much to do with health. Yet, there is hope: armed with the knowledge Davis provides, you too may get a correct and detailed accounting of what you actually owe often far less than the hospital bill might imply. If enough Americans understand the true costs, both in money and in deaths from reliance on a crippled system, we may be able to change to a fairer, more rational, healthier system for all of us.
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This is a well written and researched book illuminating the dark interior of health care financing, ranging across billing practices for physician services, drugs, laboratory, and hospital services. A penetrating analysis from a consumer's point of view, unique in its detail, which shows how complex, fragmented, unaffordable, and unsustainable our market-based health care "system" has become. Motivated by the tragic illness of a family member, Davis carries his research to a study of our system as it compares with those of other industrialized nations, making a compelling case for a publicly financed system of single-payer national health insurance. --John P. Geyman, M.D., Professor Emeritus, Family Medicine, University of Washington; author of The Corporate Transformation of Health Care: Can the Public Interest Still Be Served?
Neil Davis brings to bear his experience as a scholar and educator to present a complex subject in an understandable and compelling manner. Mired is a valuable compendium about our dysfunctional heath care 'non-system.' It should be read by medical providers and patients alike. --Alan H. Morris, MD, Orthopaedic Surgeon and former member of the AMA/Specialty Society RBRVS Update Committee
Mired offers an eloquent indictment of America's health care system:
Neil Davis brings to bear his experience as a scholar and educator to present a complex subject in an understandable and compelling manner. Mired is a valuable compendium about our dysfunctional heath care 'non-system.' It should be read by medical providers and patients alike. --Alan H. Morris, MD, Orthopaedic Surgeon and former member of the AMA/Specialty Society RBRVS Update Committee
Mired offers an eloquent indictment of America's health care system:
Patricia Davis was a self-employed resident of Ester who was diagnosed with Stage III lung cancer in the fall of 2004. She had previously noticed indications that she was ill, but put off seeking help out of concern over potential costs because she lacked health insurance. Eventually, however, she was overtaken by the symptoms, saw a doctor, and entered treatment.
Patricia's parents then did what most parents would do under such circumstances: They offered to pay as many of her bills as they could. However, her father, a retired University of Alaska Fairbanks geophysicist named Neil Davis, did something most people don't do: He examined those bills. And when he had questions about what he found, he looked for answers. And so he found himself, as the title of his latest book puts it, "Mired in the Health Care Morass."...For all our insistence on the benefits of the free market, our health care system costs more to administer than any other and gives us lousy coverage in return. Our national health lags far behind that of most developed nations, there is much more bureaucracy in our medical system than can be found anywhere else, and we have some 47 million citizens who have no insurance at all. Meanwhile, medical bills are the cause of half of all bankruptcies. Our country is going broke paying for a system that isn't working.
"Every healthcare system has its deficiencies," Davis tells us, "but the American system takes the cake, and is rightly described as dysfunctional. It is terribly expensive, and getting more so by the year, yet it fails to provide the health care that the citizens of a modern nation should have."Davis argues persuasively for adopting a single-payer system similar to Canada's, but getting there won't be easy. There are too many interests primarily insurers and pharmaceutical outfits with deep pockets who oppose changing anything. And Americans are famous for refusing to do things the smart way (this is, after all, a country that clings to the Electoral College and shuns the metric system). We all know our health care needs fixing, but we refuse to do it at great cost to our society in lost lives.
"The National Academies' Institute of Medicine estimates that 18,000 people die prematurely each year as a result of being uninsured," Davis writes. Patricia Davis was one of those 18,000. She died on July 31, 2006. It is nothing short of immoral that in the wealthiest nation on earth Patricia Davis felt fiscally incapable of seeking treatment when she first needed it. It's even more shameful that she and her family were put through such a financial nightmare in the last months of her life. Her father's book is an eloquent effort at gaining some semblance of justice on behalf of his lost daughter. Read it and perhaps you will understand why our country must do better. --David A. James, Fairbanks Daily News-MinerAbout the Author
Longtime Alaskan Neil Davis is known for his accomplishments as a geophysicist with NASA and the Geophysical Institute of the University of Alaska in Fairbanks. He is the author of the newspaper column "Dose of Reality" (on medical finances), two novels, a collection of short stories, and several nonfiction books on history and science. Davis and his wife, Rosemarie, live near Fairbanks. Their children, grandchildren, and four great-grandchildren also live in Alaska.
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Longtime Alaskan Neil Davis is known for his accomplishments as a geophysicist with NASA and the Geophysical Institute of the University of Alaska in Fairbanks. He is the author of the newspaper column "Dose of Reality" (on medical finances), two novels, a collection of short stories, and several nonfiction books on history and science. Davis and his wife, Rosemarie, live near Fairbanks. Their children, grandchildren, and four great-grandchildren also live in Alaska.
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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Highly recommended for anyone who has been scorned by the American health care system,
By Midwest Book Review (Oregon, WI USA) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Mired in the Health Care Morass: An Alaskan Takes on America's Dysfunctional Medical System for his Uninsured Daughter (Paperback)
A shocking note Americans don't know about medical bills: They don't reflect the costs of the medicine itself. "Mired in the Health Care Morass: An Alaskan Takes On America's Dysfunctional Medical System for his Uninsured Daughter" is the tale of accomplished author and geophysicist Neil Davis's fight against the American Health care system and how it is extorting Americans when they are at their most vulnerable - when they are ill themselves or deathly concerned for the well being of their loved ones. With advice to fight these corrupt practices and get the more correct and proper hospital bill, "Mired in the Health Care Morass: An Alaskan Takes on America's Dysfunctional Medical System for his Uninsured Daughter" is highly recommended for anyone who has been scorned by the American health care system and for community library social issues shelves everywhere.
Diane C. Donovan California Bookwatch
5.0 out of 5 stars
A Must read for all Healthcare recipients,
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This review is from: Mired in the Health Care Morass: An Alaskan Takes on America's Dysfunctional Medical System for his Uninsured Daughter (Paperback)
Mired in Healthcare Morass reads like a mystery novel made into a college textbook. As a graduate student in Healthcare Administration, Mr. Davis has reached me with facts and figures and a passion for the cause of healthcare for us all. In his expose' of the mess that healthcare in America is, Davis also gives us some serious guidance on how to and what to fix to make this system work. Fairness and price equitability considered , the investment I made in buying this book has paid for itself over several times and will again and again. it is a handbook that can save you thousands by understanding who the average person is dealing with in the entire processof the cost er'sw billing in the Healthcare system.
This book is no philosophical treatise. It is the true story of how Neal Davis struggled with and investigated the healthcare system in order to save his dying daughter from cancer. His loss is ours, and we can add value to his work and and his daughter's life by taking the information from this book and making positive impact with it on everyone's health.
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