Policy Challenges In Modern Health Care

by Mechanic, David; Rogut, Lynn B.; Colby, David C.

• ISBN13: 9780813535784
• ISBN10: 0813535786
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2005-05-25
• Publisher: Rutgers Univ Pr

Summary

This book provides perspectives on how the US health care system evolved, why it faces the challenges that it does, and why reform is so difficult to achieve. It tackles issues including tobacco, obesity, gun violence, insurance gaps, the rationing of services, the power of special interests and medical errors. This book provides perspective on how the US health care system evolved, why it faces the challenges that it does, and why reform is so difficult to achieve. It tackles issues including tobacco, obesity, gun violence, insurance gaps, the rationing of services, the power of special interests, medical errors, and the nursing shortage. Health care delivery in the United States is an enormously complex enterprise, and its $1.6 trillion annual expenditures involve a host of competing interests. While arguably the nation offers among the most technologically advanced medical care in the world, the American system consistently under performs relative to its resources. Ga

Table of Contents

Preface	vii
ALVIN R. TARLOV
Acknowledgments	xi
Introduction	1	(12)
DAVID MECHANIC, LYNN B. ROGUT, DAVID C. COLBY, AND JAMES R. KNICKMAN
PART I The Context of Health and Health Care Policy
1 Morality, Politics, and Health Policy	13	(13)
JAMES A. MORONE
2 Cross Pressures: The Contemporary Politics of Health Reform	26	(11)
THEDA SKOCPOL AND PATRICIA SELIGER KEENAN
3 The Employer-Based Health Insurance System: Mistake or Cornerstone?	37	(16)
SHERRY A. GLIED
4 Entrepreneurial Challenges to Integrated Health Care	53	(18)
JAMES C. ROBINSON
PART II Promoting Population Health and Reducing Disparities
5 Fundamental Sources of Health Inequalities	71	(14)
BRUCE G. LINK AND JO C. PHELAN
6 A Public Health Approach to Firearms Policy	85	(14)
DAVID HEMENWAY
7 Tobacco Policy in the United States: Lessons for the Obesity Epidemic	99	(16)
KENNETH E. WARNER
8 Patterns and Causes of Disparities in Health	115	(20)
DAVID R. WILLIAMS
9 Addressing Racial Inequality in Health Care	135
SARA ROSENBAUM AND JOEL TEITELBAUM
PART III Improving Quality of Care
10 Still Demanding Medical Excellence	151	(11)
MICHAEL L. MILLENSON
11 Preventing Medical Errors	162	(15)
LUCIAN L. LEAPE
12 Improving Quality through Nursing	177	(12)
LINDA H. LIKEN
13 Improving Medicare for Beneficiaries with Disabilities	189	(17)
LISA I. IEZZONI
14 Specialization, Specialty Organizations, and the Quality of Health Care	206	(17)
ROSEMARY A. STEVENS
PART IV Frameworks for Fairness in Health Care
15 Integrating People with Mental Illness into Health Insurance and Social Services	223	(15)
RICHARD G. FRANK AND THOMAS G. MCGUIRE
16 Accountability for Reasonable Limits to Care: Can We Meet the Challenges?	238	(11)
NORMAN DANIELS
Contributors	249	(6)
Name Index	255	(8)
Subject Index	263