I’m reading Dr. Calott Wang’s book right now and this guest post is a good introduction to what her book is about.
\n~Amber<\/p>\n
Is Wall Street Making Life or Death Decisions? By Dora Calott Wang, M.D., If so, is Wall Street deciding your medical care?<\/p>\n It’s hard to recall that for-profit corporations were once kept out of\u00c2\u00a0 Never mind that after 30 years in the free market, health care costs\u00c2\u00a0 The real issue is that modern medical care has simply, finally, gotten\u00c2\u00a0 The fair and effective distribution of life-sustaining resources like\u00c2\u00a0 How should this powerful new resource be distributed? I believe that\u00c2\u00a0 I can’t help but think that health care reform isn’t over, and wasn’t\u00c2\u00a0 I believe that health care reform will be our entire future.<\/p>\n In the meantime, for now, how is modern medical care, a new\u00c2\u00a0 Physicians and patients sit face to face and discuss medical decisions\u00c2\u00a0 The new health reform laws will obligate insurance companies to\u00c2\u00a0 But even after the new laws are implemented, health insurance\u00c2\u00a0 Our recent health reform efforts are landmark progress in the right\u00c2\u00a0 However, in the last thirty years, the values of Wall Street have so\u00c2\u00a0 \u00c2\u00a9 2010 Dora Calott Wang, M.D., author of The Kitchen Shrink: A\u00c2\u00a0 Author Bio<\/span><\/strong> For more information please visit www.doracalottwang.com and follow\u00c2\u00a0 I’m reading Dr. Calott Wang’s book right now and this guest post is a good introduction to what her book is about. ~Amber Is Wall Street Making Life or Death Decisions? By Dora Calott Wang, M.D., Author of The Kitchen Shrink: A Psychiatrist’s Reflections on Healing\u00c2\u00a0 in a Changing World Is your health insurance company… Continue reading Guest Post by Dora Calott Wang, M.D.<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[342,135,343],"class_list":["post-2667","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-dora-calott-wang-m-d","tag-guest-post","tag-the-kitchen-shrink","entry"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t
\n<\/strong><\/p>\n
\nAuthor of The Kitchen Shrink: A Psychiatrist’s Reflections on Healing\u00c2\u00a0
\nin a Changing World
\n<\/em>
\nIs your health insurance company traded on Wall Street?<\/p>\n
\nhealth care — in fact, for most of the 20th century. During this\u00c2\u00a0
\ntime, the nation’s medical system was built largely by non-profit and\u00c2\u00a0
\ncharitable organizations, which is why so many hospitals are named for\u00c2\u00a0
\nsaints. Courts across the country ruled that for corporations to\u00c2\u00a0
\nprofit from medical care was simply “against sound public policy.” In\u00c2\u00a0
\nthe early 1980’s, however, when the financial and airline industries\u00c2\u00a0
\nwere deregulated, a similar process occurred for American medicine.\u00c2\u00a0
\nFor-profit corporations became newly encouraged to take leadership of\u00c2\u00a0
\nhealth care. Deregulating health care into the free market was\u00c2\u00a0
\nintended to drive down costs and to improve care. After all, medical\u00c2\u00a0
\ncare in 1980 consumed a whopping 9.1 percent of the nation’s GDP.<\/p>\n
\nhave doubled to consume 18 percent of the GDP (with a third of these\u00c2\u00a0
\nprecious dollars wasted on bureaucracy). Never mind that health care\u00c2\u00a0
\nhas gotten increasingly inaccessible to the uninsured and even the\u00c2\u00a0
\ninsured, or that American health care has become an international\u00c2\u00a0
\nposter child for reform.<\/p>\n
\nso effective. Today, even cancer and AIDs are no longer death\u00c2\u00a0
\nsentences, and if organs fail, you try to get a new one. But prior to\u00c2\u00a0
\nthe discovery of antibiotics and vaccines in the 1930’s, leeches were\u00c2\u00a0
\nroutinely applied, and medicine was steeped in superstition. Between\u00c2\u00a0
\n1918 and 1920, three percent of the world’s population was wiped out\u00c2\u00a0
\n— by the flu.<\/p>\n
\nfood, water and shelter, is the very story of civilization. Yet now,\u00c2\u00a0
\nthanks to centuries upon centuries of civilization and scientific\u00c2\u00a0
\ninquiry, we have at last, a new life-sustaining resource — modern\u00c2\u00a0
\nmedical care, which is less than 80 years old.<\/p>\n
\nmedical care shouldn’t be considered an ordinary product, like\u00c2\u00a0
\nathletic shoes or flat screen TV’s. Rather, it is quickly becoming\u00c2\u00a0
\nessential, like water. Yet there will be no easy answers when it comes\u00c2\u00a0
\nmedical care, in this brave new world in which DNA is already being\u00c2\u00a0
\ntweaked to grow completely new organs. We are embarking on a new,\u00c2\u00a0
\ncomplex and long chapter of history.<\/p>\n
\nconcluded with the signing of the Patient Protection and Affordable\u00c2\u00a0
\nCare Act in March.<\/p>\n
\nPrometheus’ fire, being distributed and decided in the United States?<\/p>\n
\n— about whether a life-sustaining cardiac bypass surgery is\u00c2\u00a0
\nwarranted, or whether a new liver should be gotten. But ultimately,\u00c2\u00a0
\nthe purse strings on medical care are held by health insurance\u00c2\u00a0
\ncompanies.<\/p>\n
\nprovide “coverage” even when patients become sick or if they have a\u00c2\u00a0
\n“pre-existing condition” or what I will call “illness”. The PPACA has\u00c2\u00a0
\na provision on “administrative simplification” scheduled to take\u00c2\u00a0
\neffect in 2014, which aims to streamline the process of doctors and\u00c2\u00a0
\nhealth care providers asking for approvals from health insurance\u00c2\u00a0
\ncompanies before treatments are rendered.<\/p>\n
\ncompanies, many of them for-profit corporations traded on Wall Street,\u00c2\u00a0
\nwill continue to hold the purse strings on medical care.<\/p>\n
\ndirection.<\/p>\n
\ninfiltrated the values of American society that seemingly all aspects\u00c2\u00a0
\nof life are impacted, even medical care of the human body and mind,\u00c2\u00a0
\neven the everyday life or death decisions that happen in doctor\u00c2\u00a0
\noffices and hospital rooms.<\/p>\n
\nPsychiatrist’s Reflections on Healing in a Changing World<\/em>
\n<\/strong><\/p>\n
\nDora Calott Wang, M.D., is Assistant Professor of Psychiatry at the\u00c2\u00a0
\nUniversity of New Mexico School of Medicine. A graduate of the Yale\u00c2\u00a0
\nSchool of Medicine and the UCLA Neuropsychiatric Institute, she\u00c2\u00a0
\nreceived her M.A. in English literature from the University of\u00c2\u00a0
\nCalifornia, Berkeley, and has been the recipient of a writer’s\u00c2\u00a0
\nresidency from the Lannan Foundation. Her memoir, The Kitchen Shrink:\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0
\nA Psychiatrist’s Reflections on Healing in a Changing World<\/em> was\u00c2\u00a0
\npublished by Riverhead Books, The Penguin Group.<\/p>\n
\nthe author on Facebook and Twitter.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"