Flatlined : resuscitating American medicine / Guy L. Clifton.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Clifton, Guy L., 1949-

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Health care reform--United States.

Health care reform.

Medical policy--United States.

Medical policy.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (344 p.)

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

New Brunswick, N.J. : Rutgers University Press, c2009.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

Flatlined lifts the veil of secrecy on twenty-first century health care and delves into the realities of good people caught in a bad medical system. Dr. Guy L. Clifton, a practitioner as well as a policy advocate, reveals first-hand accounts of needless tragedy, such as the young man who died after a car wreck for lack of a bed in a qualified hospital and the surgeon who was dejected by the scarcity of resources needed to enable him to perform heart surgery on an uninsured man. Arguing that a lack of coordinated care and quality medical practice benchmarks result in high levels of redundancy and ineffectiveness, Clifton proposes that the key to reducing health care costs, improving quality, and financially protecting the uninsured, is to reduce wastefulness, and offers a solution for achieving success. Flatlined sounds the warning call: By 2018 Medicare and Medicaid will consume about one-third of the federal budget. American businesses now pay three times as much of their payroll for health care as global competitors, expected to worsen as health care grows at twice the rate of the U.S. economy. Based on his years of experience in policy and medicine, Clifton offers an attainable solution through the development of an American Medical Quality System.

Contents:

Frontmatter

CONTENTS

FIGURES AND TABLES

PREFACE

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

PART ONE. Why the Uninsured Should Be Covered

PART TWO. Why Health Care Is So Expensive

PART THREE. Reforming American Health Care

NOTES

INDEX

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Notes:

Description based upon print version of record.

Includes bibliographical references (p. 275-311) and index.

ISBN:

1-281-95882-4

9786611958824

0-8135-4626-5

OCLC:

437089293