Quality of Us Healthcare

U.S. Healthcare: Quality

Gerard Nicolson Cerameau

The U.S. Healthcare System: HCA-305

Instructor: Ken Feifer

March 26th, 2012

In a country where the health care system is largely provided by the private sector, only 15% of the population has health insurance coverage. A situation that pushes us from the middle/lower social class to wonder about the quality of care we are receiving. The healthcare system is as much controversial as getting the care we need, and how this one is delivered to us. The President of the United States had signed a comprehensive health reform on March 23rd, 2010, the Patient Protection Affordable Care Act (PPACA) which is expected to bring changes to the system, and this act is supposedly bringing a new momentum to the healthcare industry. The American population is actually wondering whether a deep analysis of the future trends on healthcare should give them a clear understanding of where the United States healthcare would be in the next years to come, including improvement on the safety and reliability of the healthcare system.

If we were to describe the U.S. healthcare system with all its components, we would have to say that it is a facet of complex interactions of people, institutions, and technology. For many Americans healthcare may be described as the interaction between a primary care physician and patient to address minor and urgent medical problems such as colds, flu, or back pain. A primary care physician (PCP); usually a general practitioner, a family practitioner, internist, or pediatrician, is the "forefront" caregiver or even the first health qualified personnel to estimate and treat the patient. In a physician office there are lots of routines physical examinations, anticipation such as immunization and health rerun to detect disease, and treatment of acute and chronic diseases. The healthcare system consists of all the medical personnel tied together in one field. This system may be viewed as a complex made up of three interrelated components: people in need of healthcare services called healthcare consumers; those who deliver the service, the professionals and practitioners called healthcare providers; and systematic arrangements for delivering healthcare−the public and private agencies that organize, plan, regulate finance, and coordinate services−called the institutions or organizations of the healthcare system. This institutional component includes hospitals, clinics, and home-health agencies; the insurance companies and programs that pay for services like Blue Cross/Blue Shield, managed-care plans such as health maintenance organizations, and preferred providers organizations; an entitlement program like Medicaid. Also included are agencies and associations that research and monitor the quality of health care services; license and accreditation providers and institutions; local, state, and national professional societies; and the companies that produce medical technology, equipment, and pharmaceuticals (<a href="http://www.libraryindex.com/pages/1817/Nation-s-Health-Care-System-COMPONENTS-HEALTH-CARE-SYSTEM.html">The Nation's Health Care System - The Components Of The Health Care System</a>)

Despite the higher cost of our healthcare system, one would think that the service we are providing would be astonishing; we would actually see the improvement of making the hospitalized patients more comfortable in their skin. While the economy is getting tougher, the high cost of living is climbing up the trees; our healthcare system still falls behind other nations in term of quality, access, affordability. Five affluent international trading partners of the United States spend far less on health care, yet the comparative value of these countries' health systems- measured by cost, workforce health, and quality of care- is often better than that experienced by American workers and employers. And that "value gap" puts the United States at a distinct competitive disadvantage to their global peers, according to the Business Roundtable's Health System Value Comparability Study (Anonymous, 2011). Comparing the value of U.S. health care with that of the health systems of the "G-5" countries (Canada, France, Germany, Japan, and the United Kingdom), the study finds that our nation has made progress in improving healthcare value over previous years but still trailed the G-5 by 2,0.8 percentage points in 2007. "At the current rate of gap closure, it would take over 20 years for the U.S. health system to pull even with the value delivered by the health systems of the G-5 and an additional 10 years to establish a meaningful lead," the authors say. When comparing our healthcare system to other nations' healthcare organism, we would say the health insurance of certain countries are costs less than what we are paying for our insurance. Let us take Canada for example; both United States and this one have a similar health care system before Canada had to reform its system. The United States spend more money for health care on a per capita basis. In 2006, per capita healthcare spending in Canada was $3,678; and in the U.S. the amount was $6,713. During the same year, 70% of the healthcare expenditure in Canada was sponsored by the government; contrarily to the U.S. it was only 46% was funded. In both Canada and the United States, access to healthcare can be a hassle. With only a minority of the U.S. population (15%) having health coverage, Canada on the other side has as many as 5% of citizens that have not been able to find a doctor. When added to the population of uninsured, a total of 40% of Americans ages 18-64 have inadequate access to healthcare according to the consumer report study (Consumer Report, 2006). Based on the World Health Report in 2000 using data form 1997, the overall health of Canadian was ranked 35th, and the American 72nd. This is to compare both healthcare systems side by side.

In a country with over 313,252,759 people living in (http://www.census.gov/), a major need for healthcare in needed. When the populace is switching from an age group to another, the necessity for affordable, accessible healthcare is crucial for the well-being of everyone. Within the last 50 years, extensive changes in demographics and the types and availability of health care services have occurred in the United States. Older adults represent the largest population group requiring long-term care services. Current estimates place the population 65 years of age and older at 37.9 million, 12.6% of the population, or about one of every eight Americans. The number of persons aged 65 years or older is expected to grow to