Growth of Health Care Expenditures - Essay Example

The concern that continues to be raised by experts in the field has to do with the cost associated with the use of these tools, where there continues to be debate as to whether or not these state-of-the-art screening and diagnostic tools would not lead to an increase in the rate of growth of healthcare expenditure. Taking a stand on the issue, it would be said that there are two broad financial impacts of the current situation on the rate of growth of healthcare expenditure. These are short-term impact and long-term impacts.

The short-term impact of the use of state-of-the-art screening and diagnostic tools refers to the financial outcomes of using these tools from the time the spending is made to the next financial seasons when financial season when budgets are prepared. What is noted is that most health facilities purchase these tools not as part of their daily consumables but as lifetime purchases. This means that when they buy them once, they hardly buy them again for a very long time. The prices of these tools are however very high. In the short term when the health facilities would have to make huge financial allocations to make purchases, it can be said that the impact on expenditure will be massive in terms of growth. This is because the current healthcare budget is already plagued with very high demand from the need to achieve quality healthcare delivery (Henderson, 2012). Greater parts of the budgets of health facilities have tried to focus on human resource development in the past and even though this form of spending has not ceased, there has been this new form of spending.

The other form of impact is the long-term effect of this form of spending, which looks at the results that the screening and diagnostic tools will have on healthcare delivery after about a year of their usage. From this context, it can be said that the usage of these tools promotes quality healthcare delivery, a greater part of which focuses on preventive healthcare. The reason this is said is that preventive healthcare has been noted to be the outcome of intensive research and development that focuses on knowing the causes and epidemiology of diseases and trying to stop them from taking place (Cohen, Neumann & Weinstein, 2008).

Meanwhile, the advanced nature of these tools makes it much easier to achieve this. Once the spread of diseases is prevented also, the healthcare industry begins to spend very less on the purchasing of drugs and other equipment aimed at curing diseases (Cohen, Neumann & Weinstein, 2008). Comparatively also, the long-term impacts last very long. Balancing the differences between short-term and long-term impacts therefore, it can be said that the long-term impact on expenditure cancels out the short-term impact, making it logical to conclude that these state-of-the-art tools do not necessarily increase the rate of growth of healthcare expenditure. Read More