Financing Health care ( review) - Article Example

Article Review Private Gain and Public Pain: Financing American Health Care Private Gain and Public Pain: Financing American Health Care By Bruce Siegel, Holly Mead, and Robert Burke Summary The article was written by Siegel, Mead and Burke (2008) published in the Journal of Law, Medicine and Ethics. The authors proffered issues focusing on the factors that contribute to rising cost of health care and specifically on patterns of health care expenditure. By initially setting the stage for a theoretical framework of the current health care dilemma, the authors cautiously delved into probing on the factors that drive growth in health care spending, to wit: demographics of increasing population entering retiring age, emergency costs for uninsured sectors, and insufficient proactive interventions for preventive medicine, among others.

Through support from authoritative scholarly studies coming from 61 research literatures on the subject, the authors were able to present a balanced scenario of the status of health care in America and the role of health care reform by providing explanations on who are directly accountable for increased health care spending and the rationale for rising costs. The findings revealed that the previously identified factors presumably contributory to rising health costs were merely marginal expenses and the true culprits to increased health expenditure should be blamed on “the confluence of rapid technological advance and intense commercialism in medicine, which together may be the most critical factor underlying America’s swelling health care sector” (Siegel, et.

al, 2008, 645). Containment of these costs, coupled with the health reform, would ultimately assist in addressing the increasing health care expenditure in the country. Professional Critique It is one’s personal contention that the article was clearly and effectively written, with the overall presentation and structure well illustrated. The tabular data of comparative health expenditures over a ten year period assisted in evaluating trends and growth rates according to expenditure type. The pie chart shown as figure 1, likewise indicative of the appropriate distribution of health expenditures by type of service for the year 2006, provided well-defined proportions for the readers’ perusal.

The discussion was balanced and unbiased giving support and credence to the arguments through the secondary scholarly researches referenced on the subject. The professional background of the authors, all academicians with strong research backgrounds, enabled them to produce a highly objective research that could be appreciated not only by professionals in the field of health science, but also by other readers from diverse fields of endeavors. Personal Response The article turned out to be very informative and interestingly presented, making the readers want to find out the outcome of the study.

By disputing the commonly known factors for the rising health care expenditures, the authors illuminated the minds of the readers and highlighted relevant issues that the general public is not aware of. There were appropriate citations of instances or examples to clarify points of contentions and manner of illustrations that increased credibility and validity of their research. I found this article definitely worth reading. 3Qs (1) What were the identified initial factors that contribute to the increase in health care expenditures? (2) How did the authors refute the original contributory factors? (3) How would the reform attain an improvement in the status of health care in the U.S.?

Reference Siegel, B., Mead, H. and Burke, R. (2008). “Private Gain and Public Pain: Financing American Health Care.” Journal of Law, Medicine and Ethics, Winter, pp. 644 – 651.