NOTE: Free essay sample provided on this page should be used for references or sample purposes only. The sample essay is available to anyone, so any direct quoting without mentioning the source will be considered plagiarism by schools, colleges and universities that use plagiarism detection software. To get a completely brand-new, plagiarism-free essay, please use our essay writing service.
One click instant price quote
I consider the question of the managing change with the healthcare issues in a way of curtain problems and they " re solutions. First of all, let's see some current issues in the USA health care system today. New diagnostic and treatment procedures flourish in the United States. Our medical schools are of the best, our physicians of the first rank. And why not, since we spend some 15 percent of our GDP on health care? Few would argue that there's a better place to get sick than in the United States - if you can penetrate the system.
Our system is the problem, and it's only going to get worse. At dinner party, if you listen to people on the subway, if you talk with physicians, and if you talk with leaders of small business and big business, they " re all very unhappy - and confused. Private insurance companies are happy about current trends, if not happy about where we are. In the present, they " re making money. Drug companies were happier six months ago. They think they " ve been taken aback by the bad press that they " ve been getting, and they " re searching for how they can do better.
But by and large, until relatively recently, I think they were feeling - again - comfortable. The more-affluent people that are also fully insured. While they grouse about the paperwork, they have reasonable ways of accessing the tremendous advances that have taken place in the biomedical sciences, which are increasingly translated into better diagnostic care, therapy, drugs. I use the word "access" advisedly, because it isn't always easy for them either to get to the right places because of the bureaucratic constraints, because of the third-party payers who say you " ve got to have your primary-care physician refer you before you can see a specialist. But when they do gain access to the system, this group feels reasonably satisfied. National medical errors database hits one million records milestone.
Medmarx, nongovernmental database of medication errors, has received over one million medication error records to date, the U. S. Pharmacopoeia (USP) announced recently. Medmarx is an anonymous, Internet-based program used by hospitals and other healthcare organizations to report track and analyze medication errors. Since the program began in 1998, more than 900 HCOs have contributed data to use an historical review of Medmarx data reveals that approximately 46 percent of the medication errors reported reached the patient; 98 percent of the reported errors did not result in harm. JCAHO Creates IT Panel.
The Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations has created an advisory panel to recommend ways the Oakbrook Terrace, Ill. -based organization can use its accreditation process to increase the role of IT in healthcare. The panel will conduct a benchmark survey on the existing state of IT adoption in healthcare, and track progress annually. The 39 -member panel, chaired by William Jersey, M. D. , president and CEO of MGMA, includes provider representatives and reps from health insurers, academia, think tanks, IT vendors and government agencies. The Council of Smaller Enterprises is putting its considerable weight behind a push by the National Small Business Association for health care reform on a national level. The National Small Business Association, of which COSE is a member, has developed three ideas it plans to take to the federal government as ways to reform the ailing health care system, said William Lindsay III, immediate past chairman of the association, during a recent visit to Cleveland.
Those ideas are fair sharing of costs, empowering and focusing on the individual, and reducing costs while improving quality. "The fundamental problem in America is the cost of health care and the cost of insurance, " he said. "We " ve got to get everybody insured. " The Washington, D. C. -based association already has begun to lobby lawmakers to adopt the three basic principles, and they " ve been receptive so far, Mr. Lindsay said. For its part, COSE soon will lobby Ohio lawmakers on the same issues, said COSE president Jeanne Coughlin. Under the association's proposal, all Americans would be required to obtain basic health care coverage, a package that would be designed and mandated by the federal government, Mr. Lindsay said.
The basic package would cost the same for anyone in a given market, regardless of their health condition, he said. For that proposal to work, insurance companies would need to accept everyone into one insurance pool, which would spread costs broadly and reduce uncompensated care, Mr. Lindsay said. If companies provide health care coverage above the basic federal level, they would need to pay taxes on the money spent on those benefits, he said.
Those additional tax dollars then would be set aside for health insurance subsidies for people who don't qualify for Medicaid but can't afford their own insurance. It is ironic that Mrs. Jeannie Lacombe received so much attention after her death; she didn't receive much of it immediately beforehand. On the morning of February 1, the Montreal suffered chest pains and went to the nearest hospital emergency room.
Four hours later, a physician finally looked at the 66 -year-old woman, who lay on a stretcher in the hallway. She was dead. On that early February morning, Maisonneuve-Rosemont Hospital was crowded with 63 patients in a ward designed for 34. Only three of Montreal's 24 emergency rooms were not overflowing with double or triple their capacity. The problem isn't confined to Montreal. Two weeks later, in Toronto, a five-year-old boy died in an ER five hours after arriving, without having seen a physician.
At times this February, Toronto nurses have fought with ambulance attendants over the stretchers patients were brought in on. A Toronto Ambulance official commented last week that the hospitals have been refusing ambulance patients more often, and for longer periods, than at any time in the last 27 years. In Winnipeg, hospitals have been routinely on "redirect, " meaning that they accept only critical patients, and "critical care bypass, " meaning they are too crowded even for those. In Calgary, a physician arrived for work at Rocky View Hospital one day to find emergency patients lined up in the parking lot. The ER and the foyer were already filled. "I have never seen anything like that in all the years I have been practising, " he says. Calgary's regional health authority openly contemplated cancelling all elective surgeries, and near month's end, health officials in Edmonton did so.
Somehow, in the "best healthcare system in the world, " patients are waiting hours to be examined. The sickest lie on stretchers for days, awaiting admission. Some argue that a combination of winter storms and flu have placed an unusually great strain on the system. These two factors surely contributed, but how did Medicare erode to the point where minor stresses can wreak such havoc?
And is ER overcrowding such an isolated phenomenon? Last year at this time, with neither flu nor ice storm, Montreal's emergency wards were filled to 155 % capacity. And the problems with Canada's emergency rooms are only the tip of the iceberg. In truth, Medicare has been languishing for years. Consider the plight of Jim Cullen of Winnipeg. Mr.
Cullen has a potentially life-threatening abdominal aneurysm. He could bleed to death without warning unless the aneurysm is surgically repaired. Mr. Cullen has waited five long months for that surgery. Despite his optimism, he wonders every day: "How long will that (artery) wall hold out?" But because of the ER crisis, Mr. Cullen's surgery is on hold indefinitely.
Once Canada's pride and joy, Medicare is marked by long waiting lists for life-saving surgeries, inaccessible diagnostic equipment, dwindling standards of hospital care, and an exodus of good physicians. Meanwhile, Canada's population is aging. Over the next 40 years, the percentage of senior citizens will double. More seniors require more services; if we can't meet today's demand, how will we meet tomorrow's? To improve Medicare, Canadians must first answer one question: what ails the system? Some-opposition politicians, professional associations, and public-sector unions-argue that the system is simply under funded.
Others-cabinet ministers, economists, and policy experts-maintain that the system has enough money: we just have to spend it better through greater government control. If Medicare is under funded, people should pay more into the system. But according to a study by the Fraser Institute, working Canadians already spend 21 cents of every dollar they earn paying for Medicare. How much more do we need to spend? How much higher must taxes rise? The aging of the baby boomers will almost certainly bankrupt us: the Canadian Actuarial Society estimates that taxes will need to rise to an average of 94 % of income in the next 40 years to sustain the system.
If greater control is needed, governments must take a larger role in the healthcare system. This has been the trend over the past two decades, but has any government ever managed to browbeat part of the economy into efficiency? Governments are increasingly involved in hospital decision-making, but if Moscow central planning didn't work in Moscow, what makes us think it will work in Victoria, Edmonton or Toronto? When healthcare is "free, " people do not hesitate to use the system.
They request too many tests. They stay in hospitals too long. They consult too many physicians. The costs add up. Millions of Canadians suffer from problems such as insomnia, back pain, chronic fatigue, severe headaches, and arthritis: there is a great potential for them to spend vast resources to little proven benefit. In 1977, a joint Ontario government-medical association committee reviewed patients' use of the system and concluded that "demand for medical care appears infinite. " Canadians assume that in a "free" system there are no tough decisions to be made.
If the doctor suggests that you need an X-ray, you get one. But while you don't need to think about the cost of the X-ray, the folks at the Ministry of Health do. You don't worry about the cost of visiting walk-in clinics, or lengthy hospital stays, but these costs still add up. According to the Ontario Task Force on the Use and Provision of Medical Services, Ontario physicians billed $ 200 million in 1990 alone for "treating" the common cold. In Canada, the provinces have achieved cost control by restricting access to health services.
They have downsized medical schools, restricted access to specialists, and reduced the availability of diagnostic equipment. In many ways, Canada has opted for the old Soviet method of rationing-everything is free, and nothing is readily available. And so Canadians must line up for tests. For surgery. For the basic healthcare they need. Provinces have been busily "reforming" health care, but what are the long-term results?
Patients are discharged earlier from hospitals, often too early. Patients wait for treatment; some develop complications. Hospital beds are closed, reducing doctors' ability to admit patients. All these factors played a role in the ER crisis this February. To make matters worse, bureaucrats have developed elaborate spending controls, reducing the system's ability to react.
Canadians have assumed that if we make health care "free" (and pay the consequent high taxes), no one will ever need to worry about getting quality care when they need it. It seems that this assumption is false. Making health care "free" means everyone must worry about getting quality care. And yet the so-called experts continue to try to make Medicare work-against the odds, against human nature. This dooms us to longer waiting lists and more horror stories. Isn't it time we had a meaningful public discussion about health care?
Lives are at stake. Most Americans are insured...
Free research essays on topics related to: medical schools, federal government, health care system, waiting lists, health care coverage
Research essay sample on Health Care Coverage Health Care System
