Muscular Skeletal Diseases - Assignment Example

MSD: Health Care Concerns Describe the impact of this disease group on the costs in the Canadian Health Care System. Muscular skeletal diseases or MSD are responsible for more cost than any other health-related problems except cardiovascular disease. In fact, they are the second most reason for visiting primary health care physician. Nearly 25 percent of adult Canadians visited a physician for this disease each year and 73 percent of these continued to visit their primary physician without a specialist referral.

It is estimated that MSD will strain the resources of Canadian health care systems (Flook, 2006). How does the article suggest that drug therapies be managed between the primary care physician and the specialist?The management between primary care physician and specialist can be done through proper planning and policymaking. Alternative methods to manage the interface between primary care and secondary care need to be explored and tested. One such method is multidisciplinary assessment teams so that timely access to pharmacological, nonpharmacological and surgical therapies is streamlined.

In view of the aging Canadian population, successful projects in this regard must be deployed as soon as possible (Flook, 2006). How do you think this would work in the U.S. health care system? What revisions to the U.S. health care system are most important? The importance of MSD must be highlighted in the U.S. Health care system. The importance of primary care physicians in the management of MSD must be recognized and at the same time, challenges for health professionals and policymakers must be recognized.

Since even in the US, the population is aging, the problem is likely to worsen and the brunt of assessment and management of these patients must be borne by family care physicians. Optimal management of patients can be provided by multidisciplinary team assistance. What are the concerns when using the COX-2 inhibitors, and what are the concerns when using the NSAIDs? Include examples of COX-2 inhibitors and NSAIDs. COX-2 selective inhibitors are a form of NSAIDs that directly target enzyme COX-2 that is responsible for pain and inflammation.

Examples of this class of drugs are rofecoxib and celecoxib. Concerns when using COX-2 inhibitors are the adverse cardiovascular outcomes (Flook, 2006) like thrombosis, stroke and heart attack. Risk of renal failure is similar to NSAIDs. With NSAIDs, the concerns are gastrointestinal risks and derogatory effect on renal function. Examples of NSAIDs are ibuprofen, naproxen, and diclofenac.