Persuasive Essay On The Affordable Care Act

Medicare beneficiaries will experience lower costs on prescription drugs, primary, and preventive services. The new law expanded Medicare by fighting fraud, adding new benefits, and improving care for patients. Medicare will see lower cost on prescription drugs and free preventive services.

The utilization of prescription drugs has increased across all age groups in the US, with 50% of Americans taking at least one prescription drug (Rice & Unruh, 2016). This can be attributed to physician-induced demand, substitution of pharmaceuticals for other medical regimens, commercialization of the products, increase in the aging population and drug insurance coverage, and also the increase in chronic conditions. Lathan discusses the startling fact that the rate increase of prescription drugs purchased was considerably higher in contrast to the US population growth - 71% and 9% respectively (Rice & Unruh, 2016, p. 264).

The prices of prescription drugs in the United States are by far the highest in the world. [1] On average, Europeans pay 40% less than Americans for the same medications. [2] Consumers have been resorting to several ways, sometimes putting themselves in harm’s way, to alleviate the burden of high prescription drug costs. Some buy their medications online or cross the borders to neighboring countries so they would be able to afford buying their needed medications. Others have resorted to the illegal act of selling their unused medications in online forums just to recover part of their expenses. Many factors contribute to the increased drug prices in the United States including research and

The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) had mame dramatic changes in the field of the health care system, especially in Medicare, that will seriously take effect in American seniors. Indeed, much of the health law’s new spending is financed by spending reductions in the Medicare program. In addition to the provider payment reductions, Obamacare significantly reduces payments to Medicare Advantage (MA) plans by an estimated $156 billion from 2013 to 2022.( Elmendorf, letter to Speaker Boehner). About 27 percent of all Medicare beneficiaries are enrolled in MA plans, a system of regulated and private plans competing against each other as an alternative to traditional Medicare. MA plans are attractive to beneficiaries because they offer more generous and comprehensive coverage than traditional Medicare by capping out-of-pocket costs and offering drug coverage to a rasonable

The Affordable Care Act includes changes to Medicare, Medicaid, private insurance, and creates many conflicts and benefits around how it will affect health care in the future. Clearly, all items within the medical reform are connected, so that a positive impact in one area may inversely affect another. The primary change is the extension of health care coverage to the uninsured, but it comes with a cost. Costs include penalties, taxes, reduced medical access, and lower reimbursement rates for physicians and hospitals. The Affordable Care Act is conceived with a good purpose; as a result, everyone will now have access to affordable health care, although, “affordable” is not yet well defined. Health care providers will be able to continue their vocation of providing good care for our society, but in some cases, changes to insurance may still have a poor outcome.

The Affordable Care Act strengthens Medicare, offers eligible seniors a range of preventive services with no

On the whole, the Affordable Care Act reduces healthcare costs while providing better quality services for citzens accross the US. Farley says that the ACA’s reforms to Medicare saved “17 billion in fiscal year 2013” thanks to reductions in payments to private health insurance companies cover their customers through Medicare Advantage as well as adjustments to the annual updates to Medicare provider rates (Farley, 2014). This protects consumers from excessive charges by their insurance providers, by limiting how much insurance providers spend on their own services. And even though the cost of health care, per capita, is gradually increasing, the rate of that growth has decreased over time, thanks to the stipulations, as well as method of implementations, of the ACA. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++=

The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010 includes a long list of reform provisions intended to contain Medicare costs while increasing revenue, improving and streamlining its delivery systems, and even increasing services to the program.

Some of the most important provisions of the Affordable Care Act will take effect in 2011. Starting this year, the vast majority of people with Medicare will see several new benefits, including free annual wellness check-ups, recommended preventive services without cost-sharing and discounts on prescription drugs in the Medicare Part D “donut hole” (Sebelius, Health Care, 2011). In addition, new rules will hold insurance companies accountable so more of your premium dollars go to health care, and you’re more protected from unreasonable rate hikes (Sebelius, Health Care, 2011).

In 2010, the Affordable Care Act was passed by President Obama. The aim was to reform the affordability, quality, and availability of health insurance, providing increased coverage for individuals of low socioeconomic status (Kaiser Family Foundation, 2013). The establishment of the Affordable Care Act and its impact on Medicare has reduced out of pocket expenditures in prescription medications and preventative

Medications are the most common treatment used within health care and are administered by medical professionals globally (Duerden, Avery & Payne, 2013). Their use has been proven to successfully treat and prevent disease while contributing to improvements in health outcomes when used appropriately (ACSQHC, 2013). However, the common use of medications and the increasing prevalence of multi-morbidities and polypharmacy use invites an increased risk of error and associated adverse events in hospital settings. This is combined with the need to cater for the ageing population with vast and sometimes complicated medical requirements, in addition to the establishment of an array of new medications. As such, medication errors have been identified

Currently Health Care in the United States is going through a lot of changes and controversies. With a new presidency in the white house that wants to replace the Affordable Care act and eliminate it the future is very uncertain (Boerner, 2017). People are either against this decision that can dramatically change the whole market place including Medicaid and Medicare or they are in favor. Reversing the ACA will reduce increase the number of uninsured patients in the country and this means that even more people will go to an emergency room to get treated and they won’t have insurance making it an increase in uncompensated care in hospitals. The contemporary issue that health care is experiencing today is the payment rates. Americans all

Unit price growth is a factor that is very important in the pharmacy it’s what drives spending on the products needed, but utilization growth helps because it performs roles in certain therapies. One of the main drug trends taking over at the time is specialty drugs but the cost is known to start at a high end cost of $30,000 with the highest being $100,000 for this line of treatment. Specialty drugs already take up more than a quarter of drug spending in the United States although the growth rate for traditional pharmaceuticals have slowed. But there’s been works on solution’s such as modernizing payment policies and also adopting new modes of clinical studies, also working on improvement of analytical

Pharmaceutical corporations charge higher prices for prescription drugs in the United States, as compared to other countries, and lower cost could be attainable through government regulation. According to Boldrine and Levine (Levine, 2008):

Due to the high expenditure of the therapy, a large number of drug takers suffering from the diseases still cannot cure and heavy financial burden is considerable obstacle to economic development. An illustration of the burden is that American government spent about $16 billion, which equalled to 0.15% of GDP, on these treatments needed by drug users in 2002. In the same year, researchers predicted that the cost of drug-related therapy would increase to $24 billion by 2010, if expenditure of health developed proportionately (UNODC, 2012).