Recommendations for Health Care Reform, Essay Example

The United States is the only advanced economy that does not have a comprehensive health care package for its citizens. The number of citizens who have medical insurance is very limited and therefore, many cannot afford good medical care (Laurene, 2009). Health care reform has of late been one of the most popular topics of discussion in the public domain in the recent months. It was at the forefront of president Barrack Obama’s campaign strategy where he committed himself to overhauling the current American healthcare system once elected as the president.  Since then, the issue has come under great debate from all quarters, including citizens, interest groups and experts; both giving their side of opinion on the best approach on health care reform.

According to health care experts at the Indiana University, school of Medicine, a key strategy in reforming the healthcare system is to focus on prevention and primary care (Jaffrey, 2009). Therefore, for any reform to be successful, it should put emphasis on preventive and primary care services. Ensuring that there is accountability in terms of quality, controlling costs and final outcomes is very important.  “There is need to put more emphasis on ensuring that every person has access to quality but affordable health care”(Harrison,  2008).  The reason why these experts are emphasizing on prevention is because of the obvious cost implications that will go in treating chronic ailments which can be prevented. Research data show that the United States spends close to 17% of its GDP on health care, with over seventy five percent being channeled towards preventable diseases. What is therefore urgently needed is public health reform which could in the long run lead to reduction in unnecessary suffering and the costs that come with it.

The second recommendation that has been put forward by experts from the Urban Institute in Washington DC is need to develop effective health information technology infrastructure that will promote the effective exchange of information and data (Murray, D, and Weinschrott, J, 2008). This is aimed at creating a one stop health information ‘superhighway’ that will ensure that different healthcare practitioners collect and share critical information and ultimately lead to improvement of quality and reduce overall costs

Thirdly, large American employers, who are key interest groups in the health care insurance sector, have proposed several recommendations which they believe are important for the success of health care reform.  The key recommendation they made is that there is need to avoid new federal benefits mandates. According to them, employers should not be obliged by the federal government to provide specific benefits to employees because it has the potential of undermining the employers’ ability to manage their health care plans.  Employers will be less likely to pursue innovative approaches aimed at controlling costs and at the same provide quality service (Jaffrey, 2009). They are therefore against the idea of the government imposing minimum benefits requirements which will turn out to be very expensive and unaffordable.

In terms of focusing on prevention, president Obama’s proposals fit into this suggested prevention strategy. In his proposal, the president wants to achieve this by ensuring that there is disease management programmes and encourage proper integration and co-ordination of team care by forming medical home type models. The president has put emphasis on effective reviews and investment in research coupled with tackling disparities in healthcare delivery to come up with the best ways of prevention. furthermore, his plans to invest in health information systems goes in tandem with the second recommendation of improving the electronic health care system. The president appreciates the fact that most current medical records are stored in paper form which has brought about challenges in co-ordination, quality assessment and dealing with medical errors. Therefore, his commitment to invest over 10 billion dollars each year for the next five years to improve health information technology attests to this.  His proposal also support the employers side when it comes to minimum where he has consistently noted that the policies the reforms will not interfere with the employers position on minimum benefits requirements.  Employers will not be obliged to set up new minimum requirements and employees don’t need to change their health care plans if they are satisfied with what they have.

References

Laurene, A. ( 2009). Health of nations: The US health care reform debate.  3rd Edition. Chicago:  McGraw Hill

Murray, D, and Weinschrott, J. (2008). Health care reform, regulation, & innovation in the medical device industry: A Study of competitiveness in a Vital U.S. Industry. New York: Bantam Books.

Harrison, J (2008) “Paying More, Getting Less: How Much is Our Sick Health Care System Costing You?” Dollars and sense magazine.  Retrieved fromhttp://www.pnhp.org/news

Jeffrey, S. (2009).  Health care reform: without a correct diagnosis, there is no cure, security and freedom.  Journal of Health Care for the Poor and Underserved, 20(4), Harvard Medical School, Boston