Identification of Managerial, Financial, Legal and Ethical Implications - Case Study Example

Identification of managerial, financial, legal and ethical implications Lack of access to healthcare has various implications including legal, financial, managerial and ethical. The same are discussed below: Legal Implications: The United States is considered to be a world leader in terms of medical advances and research and technology in the field of medicine, however, despite the advancement in healthcare drugs and technology, a significant majority of people are devoid of any access to healthcare.

These people are those who are at the bottom of the economic pyramid which includes - those insured by Medicaid, the low wage earners, the uninsured and the underinsured. Such lack of access to healthcare highlights the inability of healthcare system to cater to the needs of all its citizens. Various healthcare reform measures have been initiated by the government across the nation with varied effect. There is an urgent need for the implementation of appropriate legislative measures to ensure equitable access to healthcare across all sections of the society regardless of their socio-economic background.

The judiciary faces several challenges in confronting issues which lead to such disparities in healthcare access, which have various political implications. This is because no legislation can be successfully passed in the absence of a consensus (Hammaker, Tomlinson, 2010). Policies must be developed to eliminate the racial disparities in healthcare and ensure equitable access to one and all. For instance the landmark 2010 Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act was recently passed and is likely to ensure greater insurance coverage and according to the estimates of the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) this new law is likely to reduce the total number of uninsured people in the U.S. by 32 million, by the year 2019 (Kovner et al., 2011). Financial Implications: There is a great heterogeneity in provision and access of health care in the United States due to the higher costs of healthcare services.

In order to eliminate the disparities in healthcare caused on account of financial barriers, the same must be lowered by ensuring provision of health insurance across different sets of population. Health insurance significantly reduces the out-of-pocket costs of healthcare and in the absence of an adequate health insurance coverage, and the rising cost of healthcare services, people with no insurance coverage may find it unaffordable thus leading them to forgo treatment and prevents them from obtaining timely healthcare.

Furthermore the frequency of visits to healthcare providers may also significantly reduce to excessive costs, and as the financial burden rise, the visits to clinics reduce significantly thus endangering their health in the process (Tienda, Mitchell, 2006). The Government in the United States provides funding to the healthcare providers on behalf of the U.S. residents who are covered under the Medicaid Insurance. Such funding help the providers in supporting healthcare jobs and creating employment in the healthcare sector; creating household income; and in increasing public spending with regard to health care.

This further helps the other sectors of the economy indirectly, since as the savings of households increase their capacity to spend on other goods and services increase simultaneously thus benefiting other sectors as well (Hammaker, Tomlinson,). Managerial Implications: The problem of lack of access to healthcare can be eliminated by effective management of the healthcare system. There has been a substantial rise in the corporate interest in the field of health care provision over the past couple of decades.

Such a change in healthcare management has significantly transformed the provision of healthcare. The key elements of a healthcare system ranging from the pharmaceutical companies to hospitals have increasingly begun adopting an organizational structure which in turn is dominated by corporate interests. Such a change has wide ranging implications on the wider society - i.e. the patients as well as the healthcare providers. The physicians are largely pressurized to maintain a desired level of profitability in tune with organizational objectives, and the patients are directly impacted and overwhelmed by the sheer complexity of dealing with such complicated business systems (Andersen, Taylor, 2007).

This further aggravates the problem of disparities in health care provision at a national level. Ethical Implications: Lack of equitable access to health care legitimately raises the issue of "justice" since equal access to healthcare is one of the key elements of bioethics. In the United States there is a wide disparity in access to healthcare across several sections of the society based on race, economic background as well as gender. According to Marmot (2006) it is not the lack of access to resources that leads to disparities and poor health, but the overt lack of empowerment of the distressed that affects individual health (in Fincham, 2011, pp. 7). References: Andersen, M. L., Taylor, H. F., (2007).

Sociology: Understanding a divese society, Cengage Learning Publication, 539 Fincham, J., (2011). Health policy and ethics, Pharmaceutical Press, Pp. 7 Hammaker, D., Tomlinson, S. J., (2010). Health Care Management and the Law: Principles and Applications, Cengage Learning Publication, Pp. 128-29 Kovner, A. R., Knickman, J., Weisfeld, V. D., Jonas, S., (2011). Jonas & Kevner's health care delivery system in the United States, Springer Publication, Pp. 151-52 Tienda, M., Mitchell, F., (2006). Hispanics and the future of America: National Research Council (U.S.), National Academic Press