U.s. Health Care System

Medicare's finances are in peril for two main reasons. The first is steadily rising health-care costs. In 1996, Medicare spending, at 12.2% of the federal budget, was the third-largest budget item. Only Social Security (the federal government's pension plan for retirees) and defense spending consumed a larger share. Medicare spending totaled $196 billion in 1996, and according to estimates from the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), it will reach $312 billion in 2002.

The health care system in the United States is composed of four basic components, financing, insurance, delivery, and payments, also known as the quad function model. This heath care systems differ between a private and government-run system and between a traditional health insurance and managed care based system. A good example of a purely government-run system in our country is the Veterans Administration (VA), health care systems, Medicare, Medicaid, and the Federal Employee Health Benefits (FEHB) program. A private run government-run system is when employers buy health insurance for their employees and employees receive health care services from private sectors. The health care delivery system needs financing because that is how you

The U.S. health care system faces challenges that indicate that the people urgently need to be reform. Attention has rightly focused on the approximately 46 million Americans who are uninsured, and on the many insured Americans who face rapid increases in premiums and out-of-pocket costs. As Congress and the Obama administration consider ways to invest new funds to reduce the number of Americans without insurance coverage, we must simultaneously address shortfalls in the quality and efficiency of care that lead to higher costs and to poor health outcomes. To do otherwise casts doubt on the feasibility and sustainability of coverage expansions and also ensures that our current health care system will continue to have large gaps even for those with access to insurance coverage.

The first characteristic of the US health care system is that there is no central governing agency which allows for little integration and coordination. While the government has a great influence on the health care system, the system is mostly controlled through private hands. The system is financed publically and privately creating a variety of payments and delivery unlike centrally controlled healthcare systems in other developed countries. The US system is more complex and less manageable than centrally controlled health care systems, which makes it more expensive. The second characteristic of the US health care system is that it is technology driven and focuses on acute care. With more usage of high technology,

On March 23, 2010, the President Obama signed the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) which represents the most significant regulatory that impacts the U.S. healthcare systems. With PPACA, 32 millions of Americans are expected the coverage and expanded access to health care and medical care. Due to the baby boomers and the downfall of the economics, there will be millions of people are seeking for low rates medical care which will create great impact on U.S. healthcare. According to Commonwealth Fund analysis, the U.S. healthcare ranks last on every cost-related. Therefore, healthcare becomes the top social and economic problem that American is dealing with. Like all other well-developed countries, there are both private and public insurers in the U.S. health care system. ‘What is unique about the U.S. healthcare system in the world is the dominance of the private element over the public element’ (Chua, 2006). Healthcare system in the Unites States can be divided into three different groups: Medicare, Medicaid, and Managed Care. Each plan provides different coverages for different groups of people.

The healthcare system in America started as a predominantly volunteer system where patients were required to pay little to nothing for treatment. Since it began, the healthcare industry has seen tremendous changes that have transformed it into a business entity which has operations like financial management, strategic planning and functional specialties to keep the industry viable. The industry is one of the largest in the country employing 15 million people with a projected increase of jobs with 3 million jobs annually. As the healthcare industry continues growing, services and personnel are changing, and various dynamics are coming into play to accommodate changes (Smith, Saunders, Stuckhardt, & McGinnis, 2013).

The cost of healthcare has and will continue to rise in the United States. Some factors that contribute to those hikes are due to the consumer demanding more complex services from health care providers. Things such as new technology, equipment, research and testing procedures, along with pharmacy, and the number of uninsured are all dynamics of the increased cost in health care. The U.S. health care system relies heavily on third-party payers; these payers include commercial insurers and the Federal and state governments. According to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, or CMS, the National Health Expenditure grew 3.6% to $2.9 trillion in 2013, or $9,255 per person, and accounted for 17.4% of Gross Domestic Product (GDP). Id.

Primary care is the backbone of many industrialized nations, but is the US one of them? Unfortunately, the answer is no. The US lags behind such developed nations in its accessibility of primary care by a huge difference. The United States healthcare system fails to ensure the timely preventative and primary care for its residents. The current estimates indicate that there is merely one physician for every 2,500 patients. Not only Medicare beneficiaries, but also privately insured adults struggle in accessing the right primary care physician at the right time. Moreover, maldistribution of physicians only exacerbates the problem, especially for those residing in health professional shortage areas (HPSA).15 Approximately, sixty-five million Americans live in designated primary care shortage areas.13 Such underserved population faces higher disease and death rates and health disparities that then result in higher rates of hospitalizations and emergency department visits—in other words, expensive medical bills.21 More governmental control on the geographic location of primary care physicians can be a first-step to fixing the shortage problem.

According to Joe Conason, "America 's current health care system wastes considerably more than a trillion dollars every year. We know that because countries such as France, Germany, Japan and Finland, with comparable standards of living to ours, spend roughly half what the United States spends annually on health care per citizen, while covering everyone and achieving better results." (Conason, 2009) The United States healthcare financial systems are severely flawed - affecting the overall cost control, services, and care made accessible to its clients. The rising costs in healthcare are reaching new highs, and with rising costs, there doesn 't seem to be much change in the quality of the care being given. Clients coming in and out of these

The U.S. health care system consumes a huge amount of the U.S. Gross Domestic Product, and is a massive system that provides essential and world-class care to millions of people (Niles, 2016). As a result of this huge burden of cost associated with it, the U.S. healthcare system has been critiqued, and has played a major role in sparking debates about changes to the way the U.S. healthcare system is run and organized. Thus, healthcare has been on the forefront of many American and politician minds over the last decade and beyond, and many proposals and attempts have been made to change and adapt the complex and influential U.S. healthcare system. One such attempt, that brought about incredibly influential change to the U.S. healthcare

Understanding public policy in the United States is basically understanding the concept of what the government do and why they do the things they do. Policies are made to focus on causes that matters to the people. “Public policy may regulate behavior, organize bureaucracies, distribute benefits, or extract taxes--or all these things at once” . In the United States, there are a substantial number of public policies made, and every now and then individuals are responsible individually to utilize these arrangements for their needs. Policies primarily are provided for the people under the national government for human rights and services. Public policy involves, and are inputs in all matters such as health care to welfare, social security, civil rights, defense, criminal justice, education, and taxation and so on. In this paper we will focus on introduction of how the America 's health system work. We will explore the kind of health care/insurance America provides and cover. As well as some of the challenges American citizens are facing, which are about the expenses that may affect the society in the future plus the protection of human rights and services.

In the United States, coverage and reimbursement of prescription drugs are the responsibility of both public and private payers, as opposed to European countries where coverage and reimbursement typically occurs through publicly financed national healthcare systems. CMS, the largest public payer, provides coverage for the vast majority of prescription drugs once they earn approval from the FDA. Prior to making coverage decisions, European jurisdictions typically require that high-risk, innovative, or costly devices undergo a health technology assessment.

Health care systems are organizations that are formed to meet the overall health needs of the population. Health care is regarded as one of the leading cause in promoting not only physical and mental health but the well-being of the population. Legislation is implemented requiring government to offer services to all members of its society. The role of health services and the organizations that provide aid is to focus on the health of an individual and to uphold their human rights. According to WHO (2013), a “well-functioning health care system requires a robust financing mechanism, a well-trained and adequately-paid workforce, reliable information on which to base decisions and policies, and well maintained facilities and logistics to deliver quality medicines and technologies (World Health Organization; 2013).

The U.S. health care system faces challenges and it is urgent that the American people

The United States' health care system has remained a debatable issue for a long time. People have two extreme views about the system. The people in favor of the system proves their point by saying that United States have the best health care system in the world ad their extremely advanced medical facilities, technology usage and medical facilities are the symbols of a highly effective health care system. On the other hand, a large mindset is that the United States' health care system is inefficient because still the highest number of chronic patients of the world exist in United States. Despite of having the highest spending in health care, United States is unable to eradicate fatal diseases; people are still suffering due to lack of health insurance facilities and administrative carelessness. This paper deals with the previous and current working of the United States' health care system and the future implications for the betterment of the system.