THE FORENSIC CASE FILES
Diagnosing and Treating the Pathologies of the American Health System
by David Barton Smith (Drexel University, USA)
Table of Contents (80k)
Preface (42k)
Chapter 1: Introduction: Fixing Healthcare in the United States (74k)
This book provides unique insights into the current heated healthcare reform debate in the United States and the expanding US$2 trillion industry that is the focus of public concern. The author's extensive experience as an educator, consultant, researcher and author of five well-received books on that system provides a unique resource of largely unreported cases to mine. These vivid case studies weave the history, richness and complexity of the problems faced by patients and service providers into fascinating Byzantine intrigues. They illustrate the underlying structural problems that have produced disparities in treatment, escalating costs, unsafe and inadequate care, the demoralization of the many decent and committed people who work within the system and passionate calls for reform. Highly readable, the book also offers a candor and richness in detail that is typically lacking in textbooks, academic journal articles and the popular press.
|
| |
Contents: |
- Introduction: Fixing Healthcare in the United States
- Governance: Who's in Charge?
- The Medical Staff: Villains of Victims?
- Nursing: Where Is It Going and Why Does It Never Get There?
- Financing: How Gold Rules
- The Market: Why It Doesn't Work — Or Does It?
- Forecasting Trends and Repackaging the Future
- Diagnosing and Treating the Pathologies of the US Health System
|
| |
| Readership: Written to provide essential background for the general reader on the current health care reform debate, it should be required reading for health care professionals, health care managers, and health care policymakers. It will also serve as an essential supplementary text for upper-level undergraduate courses in health policy and for introductory graduate health systems management and policy courses for those planning to enter careers in the health sector. |
| |
“Shines a bright, penetrating light on the US health care system and exposes many of the pathologies that restrict access to care, cause harm to patients and drive up costs for everyone. The cases are real, maddening and wonderfully instructive. A must read for anyone committed to improving health and medical care.” |
Thomas G Rundall
Executive Associate Dean
School of Public Health
University of California, Berkeley |
| |
“Forensic Case Files is ingenious in its use of compelling examples of organizational misadventures and catastrophes to call attention to the need for health care reform. The cases reviewed here bridge the great divide in health care between those mostly interested in clinical outcomes and others who thrive on the financial opportunities inherent in organizational complexity and the immense scale of resources devoted to health services . The volume is a very useful supplemental text for courses in health care services and policy because the cases illustrate very vividly why it is so difficult to get value for our investments in health care in the absence of fundamental change in the organization and financing of health care.” |
Linda H Aiken
University of Pennsylvania
The Claire M Fagin Leadership Professor of Nursing Professor of Sociology Director
Center for Health Outcomes and Policy Research University of Pennsylvania |
| |
“Professor Smith is the rare author who combines scholarly rigor and the ability to engage the reader with a good story, well told. By using specific case illustrations, he persuasively conveys broad insights developed over a career spent analyzing the pathologies that infect America's health care system. And those insights, sadly, are dead on.” |
Gordon Bonnyman
Executive Director
Tennessee Justice Center |
| |
“Case by case Smith reveals the pathologies that plague the US Health System. As he describes ‘perhaps the best way to learn how to do things right is by learning how wrong things can go’. The Forensic Case Files focuses on the major challenges facing the US health system — governance, medical staff relations, nursing, financing, the role of markets to name a few. Each set of cases are prefaced by an introduction illustrating how the cases fit into larger context of health care. This is not a jumble of entertaining vignettes but a thoughtful and insightful analysis from which to learn important lessons to guide future actions. For those who believe ‘the US health care is the best in the world’ Smith will clearly challenge their perception. For others who are committed to health care reform, Smith provides further evidence to push on with renewed energy to fulfill the potential and expectations of providing quality care for all.” |
Arnold D Kaluzny
Professor Emeritus of Health Policy and Management
Gillings School of Global Public Health
The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
|
| |
“A thoughtful presentation of gripping stories that sound an alarm for radical reform of our healthcare system … Stories of human tragedy that illustrate how doctors, patients and administrators all suffer when our profit driven healthcare system ignores or destroys ethics and morality … Individually and collectively, these stories highlight the economic and human costs of a health care system dominated by and dependent on private, unregulated business ventures.” |
Frank M McClellan
Professor
Beasley School of Law
Temple University |
| |
“The case studies presented by Professor Smith tell a compelling story of why the health care system in the United States must be reformed, but also how challenging of a task that will be. By weaving together real world examples — many bad, some mixed, a few good — among a variety of health care institutions, the book provides key lessons as we attempt to create a reformed system. While markets inevitably will play a strong role, the book provides a compelling case for why they must be closely monitored and regulated; government must play an essential and positive role in such a transformation.” |
Thomas Rice
Professor
UCLA School of Public Health |
| |
“Through incisive cases, David Barton Smith provides readers with fundamental lessons in health system ethics. This book is must reading in an age of health reform.” |
Sara Rosenbaum
Hirsh Professor and Chair
Department of Health Policy
School of Public Health and Health Services
The George Washington University Medical Center
|
| |
“David Barton Smith's earlier books established him as a gifted story teller. The Forensic Case Files demonstrates again his ability to bring forward the lines of development in complex stories that are crafted to illuminate their important administrative and policy implications. Both a textbook and source of useful insight for experienced senior executives, The Forensic Case Files is a hard to put down ‘page turner.’” |
Gary L Filerman, PhD
Senior Vice President and Chairman
Health Management and Policy Group
|
| |
| 216pp |
|
Pub. date: Nov 2009 |
|
|
| 216pp |
|
Pub. date: Nov 2009 |
|
|
|
|
