Insuring America's Health

Insuring America's Health PDF Author: Institute of Medicine
Publisher: National Academies Press
ISBN: 0309091055
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 225

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Book Description
According to the Census Bureau, in 2003 more than 43 million Americans lacked health insurance. Being uninsured is associated with a range of adverse health, social, and economic consequences for individuals and their families, for the health care systems in their communities, and for the nation as a whole. This report is the sixth and final report in a series by the Committee on the Consequences of Uninsurance, intended to synthesize what is known about these consequences and communicate the extent and urgency of the issue to the public. Insuring America's Health recommends principles related to universality, continuity of coverage, affordability to individuals and society, and quality of care to guide health insurance reform. These principles are based on the evidence reviewed in the committee's previous five reports and on new analyses of past and present federal, state, and local efforts to reduce uninsurance. The report also demonstrates how those principles can be used to assess policy options. The committee does not recommend a specific coverage strategy. Rather, it shows how various approaches could extend coverage and achieve certain of the committee's principles.

Insuring America's Health

Insuring America's Health PDF Author: Institute of Medicine
Publisher: National Academies Press
ISBN: 0309091055
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 225

Get Book

Book Description
According to the Census Bureau, in 2003 more than 43 million Americans lacked health insurance. Being uninsured is associated with a range of adverse health, social, and economic consequences for individuals and their families, for the health care systems in their communities, and for the nation as a whole. This report is the sixth and final report in a series by the Committee on the Consequences of Uninsurance, intended to synthesize what is known about these consequences and communicate the extent and urgency of the issue to the public. Insuring America's Health recommends principles related to universality, continuity of coverage, affordability to individuals and society, and quality of care to guide health insurance reform. These principles are based on the evidence reviewed in the committee's previous five reports and on new analyses of past and present federal, state, and local efforts to reduce uninsurance. The report also demonstrates how those principles can be used to assess policy options. The committee does not recommend a specific coverage strategy. Rather, it shows how various approaches could extend coverage and achieve certain of the committee's principles.

America's Uninsured Crisis

America's Uninsured Crisis PDF Author: Institute of Medicine
Publisher: National Academies Press
ISBN: 0309140889
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 238

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Book Description
When policy makers and researchers consider potential solutions to the crisis of uninsurance in the United States, the question of whether health insurance matters to health is often an issue. This question is far more than an academic concern. It is crucial that U.S. health care policy be informed with current and valid evidence on the consequences of uninsurance for health care and health outcomes, especially for the 45.7 million individuals without health insurance. From 2001 to 2004, the Institute of Medicine (IOM) issued six reports, which concluded that being uninsured was hazardous to people's health and recommended that the nation move quickly to implement a strategy to achieve health insurance coverage for all. The goal of this book is to inform the health reform policy debateâ€"in 2009â€"with an up-to-date assessment of the research evidence. This report addresses three key questions: What are the dynamics driving downward trends in health insurance coverage? Is being uninsured harmful to the health of children and adults? Are insured people affected by high rates of uninsurance in their communities?

Care Without Coverage

Care Without Coverage PDF Author: Institute of Medicine
Publisher: National Academies Press
ISBN: 0309083435
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 213

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Book Description
Many Americans believe that people who lack health insurance somehow get the care they really need. Care Without Coverage examines the real consequences for adults who lack health insurance. The study presents findings in the areas of prevention and screening, cancer, chronic illness, hospital-based care, and general health status. The committee looked at the consequences of being uninsured for people suffering from cancer, diabetes, HIV infection and AIDS, heart and kidney disease, mental illness, traumatic injuries, and heart attacks. It focused on the roughly 30 million-one in seven-working-age Americans without health insurance. This group does not include the population over 65 that is covered by Medicare or the nearly 10 million children who are uninsured in this country. The main findings of the report are that working-age Americans without health insurance are more likely to receive too little medical care and receive it too late; be sicker and die sooner; and receive poorer care when they are in the hospital, even for acute situations like a motor vehicle crash.

America's Children

America's Children PDF Author: Institute of Medicine and National Research Council
Publisher: National Academies Press
ISBN: 0309065607
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 217

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Book Description
America's Children is a comprehensive, easy-to-read analysis of the relationship between health insurance and access to care. The book addresses three broad questions: How is children's health care currently financed? Does insurance equal access to care? How should the nation address the health needs of this vulnerable population? America's Children explores the changing role of Medicaid under managed care; state-initiated and private sector children's insurance programs; specific effects of insurance status on the care children receive; and the impact of chronic medical conditions and special health care needs. It also examines the status of "safety net" health providers, including community health centers, children's hospitals, school-based health centers, and others and reviews the changing patterns of coverage and tax policy options to increase coverage of private-sector, employer-based health insurance. In response to growing public concerns about uninsured children, last year Congress voted to provide $24 billion over five years for new state insurance initiatives. This volume will serve as a primer for concerned federal policymakers and regulators, state agency officials, health plan decisionmakers, health care providers, children's health advocates, and researchers.

Ensuring America's Health

Ensuring America's Health PDF Author: Christy Ford Chapin
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 110704488X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 373

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Book Description
This book provides an in-depth evaluation of the U.S. health care system's development in the twentieth century. It shows how a unique economic design - the insurance company model - came to dominate health care, bringing with it high costs; corporate medicine; and fragmented, poorly distributed care.

Access to Health Care in America

Access to Health Care in America PDF Author: Institute of Medicine
Publisher: National Academies Press
ISBN: 0309047420
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 240

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Book Description
Americans are accustomed to anecdotal evidence of the health care crisis. Yet, personal or local stories do not provide a comprehensive nationwide picture of our access to health care. Now, this book offers the long-awaited health equivalent of national economic indicators. This useful volume defines a set of national objectives and identifies indicatorsâ€"measures of utilization and outcomeâ€"that can "sense" when and where problems occur in accessing specific health care services. Using the indicators, the committee presents significant conclusions about the situation today, examining the relationships between access to care and factors such as income, race, ethnic origin, and location. The committee offers recommendations to federal, state, and local agencies for improving data collection and monitoring. This highly readable and well-organized volume will be essential for policymakers, public health officials, insurance companies, hospitals, physicians and nurses, and interested individuals.

The Wages of Sickness

The Wages of Sickness PDF Author: Beatrix Hoffman
Publisher: Univ of North Carolina Press
ISBN: 0807860727
Category : Health & Fitness
Languages : en
Pages : 280

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Book Description
The Clinton administration's failed health care reform was not the first attempt to establish government-sponsored medical coverage in the United States. From 1915 to 1920, Progressive reformers led a spirited but ultimately unsuccessful crusade for compulsory health insurance in New York State. Beatrix Hoffman argues that this first health insurance campaign was a crucial moment in the creation of the American welfare state and health care system. Its defeat, she says, gave rise to an uneven and inegalitarian system of medical coverage and helped shape the limits of American social policy for the rest of the century. Hoffman examines each of the major combatants in the battle over compulsory health insurance. While physicians, employers, the insurance industry, and conservative politicians forged a uniquely powerful coalition in opposition to health insurance proposals, she shows, reformers' potential allies within women's organizations and the labor movement were bitterly divided. Against the backdrop of World War I and the Red Scare, opponents of reform denounced government-sponsored health insurance as "un-American" and, in the process, helped fashion a political culture that resists proposals for universal health care and a comprehensive welfare state even today.

The Price We Pay

The Price We Pay PDF Author: Marty Makary
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA
ISBN: 1635574129
Category : Health & Fitness
Languages : en
Pages : 305

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Book Description
New York Times bestseller Business Book of the Year--Association of Business Journalists From the New York Times bestselling author comes an eye-opening, urgent look at America's broken health care system--and the people who are saving it--now with a new Afterword by the author. "A must-read for every American." --Steve Forbes, editor-in-chief, FORBES One in five Americans now has medical debt in collections and rising health care costs today threaten every small business in America. Dr. Makary, one of the nation's leading health care experts, travels across America and details why health care has become a bubble. Drawing from on-the-ground stories, his research, and his own experience, The Price We Pay paints a vivid picture of the business of medicine and its elusive money games in need of a serious shake-up. Dr. Makary shows how so much of health care spending goes to things that have nothing to do with health and what you can do about it. Dr. Makary challenges the medical establishment to remember medicine's noble heritage of caring for people when they are vulnerable. The Price We Pay offers a road map for everyday Americans and business leaders to get a better deal on their health care, and profiles the disruptors who are innovating medical care. The movement to restore medicine to its mission, Makary argues, is alive and well--a mission that can rebuild the public trust and save our country from the crushing cost of health care.

Coverage Matters

Coverage Matters PDF Author: Institute of Medicine
Publisher: National Academies Press
ISBN: 0309076099
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 204

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Book Description
Roughly 40 million Americans have no health insurance, private or public, and the number has grown steadily over the past 25 years. Who are these children, women, and men, and why do they lack coverage for essential health care services? How does the system of insurance coverage in the U.S. operate, and where does it fail? The first of six Institute of Medicine reports that will examine in detail the consequences of having a large uninsured population, Coverage Matters: Insurance and Health Care, explores the myths and realities of who is uninsured, identifies social, economic, and policy factors that contribute to the situation, and describes the likelihood faced by members of various population groups of being uninsured. It serves as a guide to a broad range of issues related to the lack of insurance coverage in America and provides background data of use to policy makers and health services researchers.

Health Insurance

Health Insurance PDF Author: Michael A. Morrisey
Publisher: Asociation of University Programs in Health Administration/Health Administration Press
ISBN: 9781640551602
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
History of Health Insurance in the United States -- The Affordable Care Act -- A Summary of Insurance Coverage -- The Demand for Insurance -- Adverse Selection -- Underwriting and Rate Making -- Risk Adjustment -- Moral Hazard and Prices -- Utilization Management -- Managed Care, Selective Contracting, and the Insurance Industry -- Provider Consolidation, Monopsony Power, and the Managed Care Backlash -- Insurance Market Structure, Conduct, and Performance -- Premium Sensitivity and Health Insurance -- Compensating Differentials -- Taxes and Employer-Sponsored Health Insurance -- Employers as Agents -- Health Savings Accounts and Consumer-Directed Health Plans -- The Small-Group Market -- The Individual Insurance Market -- Health Insurance Regulation -- High-Risk Pools -- An Overview of Medicare -- Retiree Coverage -- Medicaid, Crowd-Out, and Long-Term Care Insurance.