The Truth About Health Care: Why Reform Is Not Working in America (Critical Issues in Health and Medicine)

By David Mechanic

Book Overview

The United States spends greatly more per person on health care than any other country but the evidence shows that care is often poor and inappropriate. Despite expenditures of 1.7 trillion dollars in 2003 - an amount that grows substantially each year - services remain fragmented and poorly coordinated, and more than 46 million people are uninsured. Mechanic explains how health care in America has evolved in ways that favor a myriad of economic, professional, and political interests over those of patients. While money has always had a place in medical care, big money and the quest for profits has become dominant. Mechanic examines the strengths and weaknesses of our system and how it has evolved. He pays special attention to areas often neglected in policy discussions, such as the loss of public trust in medicine, the tragic state of long-term care, and the relationship of mental health to health care.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0813538874
• ISBN13: 9780813538877
• Release Date: August 2006
• Publisher: Rutgers University Press
• Length: 228 Pages
• Weight: 1.05 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 6.3" x 9.3"

Customer Reviews

Critical Analysis by an Expert on Health Care

A slim volume, this book is critical reading for anyone who wants to understand and improve health care for everyone--by making the system work better for those who currently have access and helping to craft workable solutions to the millions left out. David Mechanic has been writing about health care for decades. Mechanic's incisive analysis gets at the fundamental conflicts of values and cash behind the intractable problem of health and health care in the United States.