U.S. Health Care Delivery System

U.S. Health Care Delivery System

Introduction

This paper has been written with regards to the characteristics and components of the United States health care delivery system. The aspects that have been discussed specifically include the access to health care, the health seeking behaviors of the population, and provider behaviors.

Discussion

Having the access to the healthcare facility is the basic right of every citizen; therefore, the aim of the US healthcare system should be to provide the best healthcare to the citizens which ever class they belong to. However, there are also some ways that can be opted for by the US healthcare system to further bring improvements in the health care system. This paper discusses those ways, and the changes that can be brought to the system and aims to provide access to the groups who belong to the minorities and those who are poor and undeserved.

The US health care system that has been designed has a major impact on the health care facilities that the citizens receive. Although the health care system has been designed in a very well manner, however, there are two issues that need to be addressed. The first issue is with regards to inadequate staffing in the health care center prevailed which resulted in mandatory overtime, in the field of nursing (ANA, 2011). This became a major problem in USA and was one of the greatest concerns of nurses in the United States. A bill was passed which made overtime for the nurses mandatory. However, it resulted in many negative consequences which could result, in an increase in the rate of negligence in the health care facilities that were provided by the nurses. The other issue that prevailed was with regards to the uninsured citizens in the US who were not entitled to get emergency health care services.

Access to Health Care

Hospitals follow a federal law that forbids the staff from accepting the patients in emergency cases who are not insured. To provide protection to the individuals who are not insured, “The Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act” has been formulated in 1986. The two major reasons why the EMTALA was formulated was to ensure that any individual is not refused medical treatment in emergency cases and to stop the hospitals from sending patients without insurance to other hospitals. Therefore, these individuals cannot get access to health care facilities.

Health Seeking Behaviors of ...