Exam Study Questions

In order to understand current health delivery services changes and formulate predictions, one must thoroughly comprehend the three developmental eras of the health care system. The evolution of our current health care system began in 1850, and has metamorphosed in three time periods, 1850 to 1900, 1900 to World War II (WW II), and WW II to 2009. Significant distinct and overlapping trends in disease prevalence, availability of health care resources, social organizations, and the public's knowledge and perception of health and illness and technology.

Medical technology is a strong suit in the U.S., most commonly found in more expensive insurance

Health insurance comes as second nature to many of us. We grab that blue and white card and put it in our wallet and forget about it until we are sick or injured. When this happens, there it is, cushioning our fall like the extra padding it provided to cushion our wallets. This is not the case with everyone, however. Many Americans have no cushion to fall back on, no blue and white card to show the emergency room when they have an unexpected health concern. No HMO with a convenient co-pay amount when their son or daughter develops an ear infection.

Conklin, T. P. (2002, Fall). Health Care in the United States: An Evolving System. Michigan Family Review, 07(), 5-17. Retrieved from

According to Austin and Wetle (2012), employers covered 83% of premium costs for single coverage and 73% for family coverage in 2009. The employee, or beneficiary, paid the difference. Then, the health insurance company pays the provider directly.

Sultz, H.A. & Young, K.M. (2010). Health Care USA: Understanding its Organization And Delivery (7th ed.). Sudbury, MA: Jones & Bartlett Publishers.

Many forces shape our current healthcare system. Our cultural belief and values shape our views on our social, political, and economic exigencies. While our beliefs and values usually represent basic or core impressions of individuals in our society, they are constantly changing. Thus, they lend a sense of dynamism to our health care system. Our cultural beliefs and values also impact our sense of ethics, which also influences how we allocate our health resources and our sense of social justice, or lack of it. And although ACA represents a major reform the American health care system, history will tell us whether it survives after the next election cycles. Many of the forces in American health care that affected its evolution in the past are present today.

As discussed in lecture (Paterniti, 2009) and in Oberlander’s analysis of the U.S. health care system, “any reform that threatens to alter the medical care arrangements of the insured is likely to provoke public opposition” (2003). Most likely, the insured are well off financially and/or politically powerful. These people, who are for the most part content with their current health insurance, would oppose

The main historical developments that have shaped the health care delivery system in the United States. Knowledge of the history of health care is essential for understanding the main characteristics of the system as it exists today. For example, the system’s historical foundations explain why health care delivery in the United States has been resistant to national health insurance, which has been adopted by Canada and most European nations. Traditionally held American cultural beliefs and values, technological advances, social changes, economic constraints, and political

The United States has a unique system of healthcare delivery, it is complex and massive. Twenty-five years ago; American citizens had guaranteed insurance, meaning the patient could see any physician and the insurance companies and patients would share the cost. But today, 187.4 million Americans have private health insurance coverage (Medicaid, 2014). The subsystems of American health care delivery are Managed care, military, vulnerable populations and integrated delivery

The health care delivery system of the united states has undergone major changes in both social and technological perspectives. Following are the two different perspectives regarding U.S healthcare delivery system;

1. What are primary care and the related concept of gatekeeping? How does that model work for the United States health care delivery system?

There are three major forces that have affected the development of the health care system within the U.S. and these forces include social, political and economic. The first force is defined as a social

Although the US health delivery system provided a myriad of both medical healthcare and social services for vulnerable population from public hospital, community health services, to food assistance…etc. Those services lack of one of the most important reasons that those services existed which is quality of the service and preventative program.

"The healthcare enterprise is one of the most important part of the U. S. social system and of our economic system as well".(Kovner and Knickman, 2011). A first defining characteristic of the health care enterprise is the line between activities directed at keeping people healthy and those directed at restoring health once the disease or injury occurs. The state of "health" is viewed differently by different people based upon the knowledge, religion, belief, and economy. There are also barriers to access to care like race, culture, sex and gender, education and resource availability.(Kovner & Knickman 2011).