Cost-Sharing under Consumer-Driven Health Care Will Not Reform U.S. Health Care

2012 ◽  
Vol 40 (3) ◽  
pp. 574-581 ◽  
Author(s):  
John P. Geyman

Various kinds of consumer-driven reforms have been attempted over the last 20 years in an effort to rein in soaring costs of health care in the United States. Most are based on a theory of moral hazard, which holds that patients will over-utilize health care services unless they pay enough for them. Although this theory is a basic premise of conventional health insurance, it has been discredited by actual experience over the years. While ineffective in containing costs, increased cost-sharing as a key element of consumer-driven health care (CDHC) leads to restricted access to care, underuse of necessary care, lower quality and worse outcomes of care. This paper summarizes the three major problems of U.S. health care urgently requiring reform and shows how cost-sharing fails to meet that goal.

2010 ◽  
Vol 43 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Scott Barstow

More than 60 years after President Truman wrote those words and nearly 100 years since health insurance was proposed by Teddy Roosevelt, the United States has joined the rest of the developed nations in initiating a health care system aimed at establishing universal insurance coverage. President Barack Obama and his colleagues in the House and Senate succeeded where many, many others failed, but just barely. The legislation, described as "similar in scope to Great Society and New Deal programs," was enacted "without the benefit of the congressional majorities of those eras" (Oberlander, 2010). For some health care advocates, the law was a disappointment, as it missed opportunity to establish a "public option" for health insurance, a publicly financed and operated program similar to Medicare to provide broad coverage. For others, the legislation constituted the transformation of the United States into a socialist state, somehow endangering America's "freedoms." The reality is that the new law keeps the predominant role of private insurance coverage and welds it to a new framework of rules, investments in improving the effectiveness and efficiency of care, and a strengthened public health sector to establish a more rational system. The law will have a significant impact oi:i counselors as both consumers and providers of health care services, and its enactment has implications for counselor advocacy.


2010 ◽  
Vol 43 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Scott Barstow

More than 60 years after President Truman wrote those words and nearly 100 years since health insurance was proposed by Teddy Roosevelt, the United States has joined the rest of the developed nations in initiating a health care system aimed at establishing universal insurance coverage. President Barack Obama and his colleagues in the House and Senate succeeded where many, many others failed, but just barely. The legislation, described as "similar in scope to Great Society and New Deal programs," was enacted "without the benefit of the congressional majorities of those eras" (Oberlander, 2010). For some health care advocates, the law was a disappointment, as it missed opportunity to establish a "public option" for health insurance, a publicly financed and operated program similar to Medicare to provide broad coverage. For others, the legislation constituted the transformation of the United States into a socialist state, somehow endangering America's "freedoms." The reality is that the new law keeps the predominant role of private insurance coverage and welds it to a new framework of rules, investments in improving the effectiveness and efficiency of care, and a strengthened public health sector to establish a more rational system. The law will have a significant impact oi:i counselors as both consumers and providers of health care services, and its enactment has implications for counselor advocacy.


2021 ◽  
Vol 46 (8) ◽  
pp. 1-2
Author(s):  
John F. Brehany ◽  

Since their inception in 1948, The Ethical and Religious Directives for Catholic Health Care Services (ERDs) have guided Catholic health care ministries in the United States, aiding in the application of Catholic moral tradition to modern health care delivery. The ERDs have undergone two major revisions in that time, with about twenty years separating each revision. The first came in 1971 and the second came twenty-six years ago, in 1995. As such, a third major revision is due and will likely be undertaken soon.


2009 ◽  
Vol 35 (1) ◽  
pp. 185-204 ◽  
Author(s):  
Adrianne Ortega

President Obama’s ambitious universal health care plan aims to provide affordable and accessible health care for all. The plan to cover the estimated 46.5 million uninsured, however, ignores the over thirty million non-citizens living in the United States. If the United States passes universal health care coverage, Congress should repeal the prohibitions of the Welfare Reform Act, extend Medicaid coverage to non-citizens, and allow non-citizens to purchase employer-based insurance coverage.President Obama’s plan follows the lead of state universal health care legislation by retaining private, employer-sponsored insurance coverage and expanding the eligibility requirements of the Medicaid program. This strategy will not aid uninsured immigrants or overburdened states and hospitals, though, because current law excludes most non-citizens from nonemergency health care services.


2016 ◽  
Vol 11 (4) ◽  
pp. 397-414
Author(s):  
Tiffany Henley ◽  
Maureen Boshier

AbstractThe passage of the Affordable Care Act in the United States has opened a policy window for the establishment of an independent Medicaid agency for the Navajo Nation. This article explores several policy options to improve health care services for Native Americans. Although there is a lack of scholarly research on the impact of healthcare reform and the effectiveness of current health care programs for American Indians, policymakers should utilize evidence-based research to inform policy decisions.


2013 ◽  
Vol 173 (2) ◽  
pp. 142 ◽  
Author(s):  
Minal S. Kale ◽  
Tara F. Bishop ◽  
Alex D. Federman ◽  
Salomeh Keyhani

Medical Care ◽  
2009 ◽  
Vol 47 (11) ◽  
pp. 1136-1146 ◽  
Author(s):  
Debra L. Blackwell ◽  
Michael E. Martinez ◽  
Jane F. Gentleman ◽  
Claudia Sanmartin ◽  
Jean-Marie Berthelot

1997 ◽  
Vol 20 (2) ◽  
pp. 13 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kevin White ◽  
Fran Collyer

The Australian political arena echoes with calls for the privatisation of health careinstitutions, the contracting-out of health care services and the introduction of variousmarketing strategies into hospital management. These calls are justified by assertingthat the market, rather than the public sector, can provide better services, greaterproductivity and increased efficiency. The National Health Strategy (1991, p 17)provides a good example. Noting that Australia is copying American investment trendsfor hospital ?chains? rather than for independent small establishments, the strategydismisses any concern over changes in ownership, pointing instead to a ?process ofrationalisation? that is to be ?welcomed?. Using evidence from the United States,United Kingdom and Australian hospital sectors, this paper examines claims for thegreater efficiency of market processes.


2016 ◽  
Vol 41 (7) ◽  
pp. 3-4
Author(s):  
Louise A. Mitchell ◽  

The foundations of modern Catholic bioethics were laid with the teachings of Christ, especially in the example He set as the Divine Physician and through the parable of the Good Samaritan. The Church thus cared for the sick and built hospitals for two thousand years before adopting a definite bioethical focus. Equally important for Catholic bioethics, especially in clinical practice, was the development of the Ethical and Religious Directives for Catholic Health Care Services. They are based on the Ethical and Religious Directives for Catholic Hospitals, which were first published by the Catholic Hospital Association in 1948, revised in 1955, and revised and adopted by the United States Catholic Conference in 1971. Secular bioethics split from theology and metaphysics in favor of the rationalism and humanism which developed out of Enlightenment thought, whereas Catholic bioethics continued its own development, keeping both its theological and its metaphysical roots.


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