The Deadly Cost of Swooping In to Save a Life (single-page version): Deregulation and America's health care system combine to make medical helicopters increasingly dangerous.
posted by parudox on Aug 20, 2009 - 28 comments

How American Health Care Killed My Father After the needless death of his father, the author, a business executive, began a personal exploration of a health-care industry that for years has delivered poor service and irregular quality at astonishingly high cost. It is a system, he argues, that is not worth preserving in anything like its current form. And the health-care reform now being contemplated will not fix it. Here’s a radical solution to an agonizing problem. (via mr) [more inside]
posted by kliuless on Aug 18, 2009 - 144 comments

E.D. Kain with a moderate conservative solution to the health care crisis
posted by reenum on Aug 13, 2009 - 88 comments

A simple question shows how complex the issue is. Chris at "Cynical C" asks his fellow citizens where they get thier health care (insurance) from and the incredible diversity of the current options and situations is immediately apparent. Quite spontaneously (but surely not unexpectedly), the question of "How much does it cost you?" becomes an essential part of the answers. Outsiders opine and tell stories and commiserate. [more inside]
posted by sid abotu on Aug 4, 2009 - 117 comments

Why We Must Ration Health Care by Peter Singer.
posted by grouse on Jul 19, 2009 - 93 comments

Debate over government-funded services heats up. [SLSO]
posted by boo_radley on Jun 30, 2009 - 47 comments

The Cost Conundrum: What a Texas town can teach us about health care. Via Musings of a Distractible Mind.
posted by zinfandel on May 28, 2009 - 40 comments

Search for an Rx - We asked Johns Hopkins administrators, physicians, and researchers about the health of a system Americans rely on to keep them healthy. Afterall, an ounce of prevention... [more inside]
posted by kliuless on Dec 3, 2008 - 15 comments

What's wrong with primary care in the US? With a new survey suggesting that nearly half of all primary care physicians would leave medicine if they had a viable alternative, and with American medical schools not generating nearly enough new doctors going into primary care, in this, their first issue to hit doctors' desks since the election, the New England Journal of Medicine has devoted their entire editorial section to exploring yet another challenge that threatens the stability of the US health care system. Video of the roundtable discussion. Individual essays, at times touching, at times hopeful, from various primary care perspectives in the US and Britain. [more inside]
posted by Slarty Bartfast on Nov 18, 2008 - 47 comments

Two years since Massachusetts instituted major statewide healthcare reform, the statistics are coming in. 340,000 residents, roughly half the state's previously uninsured, are now insured. The state says that 95% of its population is now covered, based on Department of Revenue estimates. However, a large portion of them are enrolled through state-subsidized insurance programs, and those program's rate of enrollment have far outpaced estimates. This has led lawmakers to forsee a budget shortfall. Premiums and co-pays are going up, cigarette taxes have increased, and a cost control proposal is making its way through the legislature. Assessments have been all over the map.
posted by Weebot on Jul 2, 2008 - 79 comments

An analysis of the medical care provided to the family of Homer J. Simpson from the Canadian Medical Association Journal.
posted by jtron on May 28, 2008 - 22 comments

Decline of an Iraqi Hospital: War Takes Toll on Baghdad Psychiatric Hospital. [Via Mind Hacks]
posted by homunculus on May 22, 2008 - 6 comments

Sick Around the World, the newest documentary piece produced by PBS's Frontline asks: "Can the U.S. learn anything from the rest of the world about how to run a health care system?" Having previously shared a Pulitzer Prize with The New York Times, and produced such quality programs as Bush's War, this should be well worth a mere hour of your time.
posted by aheckler on Apr 15, 2008 - 144 comments

The state of Oregon is holding a health insurance lottery where 91,000 hopeful enrollees will be competing for a couple thousand spots under the Oregon Health Plan, the state's Medicaid program. OHP was created to cover those who made too much to enroll in traditional Medicaid but too little to afford market healthcare, and this development comes as a result of budget cuts and a subsequent enrollment closure in July of 2004. It's a far cry from the universal health care coverage that the plan was suppose to lead to, and marks a dramatic turn for the state's once-ambitious health care reforms.

(Previously in dystopic health care developments)
posted by Weebot on Mar 30, 2008 - 64 comments

Mythbusting Canadian Health Care, Part I. Part II: Debunking the Free Marketeers. [Via Orcinus.]
posted by homunculus on Feb 13, 2008 - 227 comments

Creative Destruction: The Best Case Against Universal Health Care. [Via The Mahablog.]
posted by homunculus on Nov 14, 2007 - 82 comments

"In 2003, Americans spent an estimated US$5,635 per capita on health care, while Canadians spent US$3,003... Canada’s single-payer system, which relies on not-for-profit delivery, achieves health outcomes that are at least equal to those in the United States at two-thirds the cost." What do wealthy, educated Americans living in Canada think?
posted by Blazecock Pileon on Jul 3, 2007 - 137 comments

Cancer Cure Patented A group of researchers claim that they are patenting a possible cure for cancer involving nothing more than sugar and short-chain fatty acid combination.
posted by TravisJeffery on Jan 4, 2007 - 26 comments

The Health Care Crisis and What to Do About It. Is it time to socialize medicine in the US?
posted by homunculus on Nov 9, 2006 - 128 comments

Coverage with Evidence Development. Never heard of it? Me neither, until today. It's what they call this idea: if you want to be covered by Medicare, you're forced to participate in medical research. The AMA approves (article abstract only). So much for informed consent.
posted by ikkyu2 on Sep 4, 2006 - 26 comments

Today, about 17,000 American medical students and almost as many foreign trained doctors learn what types of doctors they will be. Yes, it’s Match Day. Ok, while most people probably could care less about this post, it presents an intriguing look into the forces (i.e. how the ratio between specialists and generalists arises and to note: more specialists equals more procedures and costlier health care) that shape American health care today. And, it represents the strange culmination of years of study (at least 8+ years after high school) that many students take just to leave it up to a strange algorithm that is under a anti-trust lawsuit as they wake up one day in March and learn where they will be spending the next (at least) three years of their life. Also, if you see a recent graduate of an "ADORE+P" residency -- Anesthesiology, Dermatology, Orthopedics/Optho, Radiology, ENT/Emergency Room medicine (plus, of course, Plastic surgery) -- (the professions that work great hours and make the most money) -- congratulate her or him on being the best (statistically) of the crop.
posted by narebuc on Mar 15, 2006 - 33 comments

Hospital Compare: which are the better hospitals in your area?
posted by daksya on Apr 2, 2005 - 8 comments

Conscience Clauses and Health Care --"Yes, we need to respect individual freedom of religion. But at what point does it cross the line of not providing essential medical care? At what point is it malpractice?" she asked. "If someone's beliefs interfere with practicing their profession, perhaps they should do something else." The Protection of Conscience Project feels differently: Protection of Conscience Laws are needed because powerful interests are inclined to force health care workers and others to participate, directly or indirectly, in morally controversial procedures, while NARAL says: ... Many of these clauses go far beyond respecting individuals' beliefs to the point of harming women by not providing them with full information or access to medical treatment. Medicine, not ideology, should determine medical decisions.
posted by amberglow on Sep 17, 2004 - 69 comments

The number of health-related deaths in the United States in 2000 was over 1 million. The United States spends $13.6BN per year on ALL medical research. For $100BN-$200BN could we save 110,000 more people each year from health-related deaths? High end estimates of homelessness put the number around 3.5 million in the United States. For $30,000 each (100B/3.5M) we could house, feed and provide vocational training for every homeless person. Alternatively, we could provide $2,500 per year for insurance to each person without health care.
posted by PigAlien on Jan 27, 2003 - 38 comments

Investigating the Power of Prayer
"According to Targ, the prayed-for patients had fewer and less severe new illnesses, fewer doctor visits, fewer hospitalizations and were generally in better moods than those in the control group."
Mayo Clinic researchers have found no such connection. They reported last month that in their trials of distant prayer on 750 coronary patients, they found no significant effect. Why the difference?"
posted by onegoodmove on Apr 13, 2002 - 20 comments

America, Heal Thyself. "Racial and ethnic minorities tend to receive lower-quality health care than whites do, even when insurance status, income, age, and severity of conditions are comparable, says a new report from the National Academies' Institute of Medicine. 'Disparities in the health care delivered to racial and ethnic minorities are real and are associated with worse outcomes in many cases, which is unacceptable. The real challenge lies not in debating whether disparities exist, because the evidence is overwhelming, but in developing and implementing strategies to reduce and eliminate them.'"
posted by fold_and_mutilate on Mar 20, 2002 - 17 comments

BOUTIQUE MEDICAL PRACTICES The answer to very good health care in America. If you can afford it. Otherwise....
posted by Postroad on Mar 3, 2002 - 7 comments

Convict Heart Transplant A 31 year old 2 time felon just got a heart transplant, costing tax payers close to $1 million dollars. With an annual additional cost of $15,000. Right? Wrong? I'm not so sure.
posted by SuzySmith on Jan 30, 2002 - 15 comments

World Health Report 2000 ranks world health care systems. France #1; UK #18; Canada #30; USA #37
posted by mkn on Jun 20, 2000 - 0 comments