In this review on whether the the United States (U. S) Medical Care needs reform, the following areas are discussed in depth: 1. ) Role of the public health in medical care. 2. ) Ethical issues pertaining to availability of resources 3. ) Healthcare expenses Role of the public health in medical care. In definition, medical care is mostly concerned with an individual person where as public health is mainly concerned with the community at large. But in cases of infectious diseases, the public health plays a very vital role by treating a single person to avoid the spread of the disease to the public.
In the U. S. public health has well been handled through the provision of treatment for tuberculosis by setting up several Health Departments to treat and monitor the patient’s progress. The responsibility has also been enhanced through provision of free medical services for those who cannot afford it and also do not have medical insurance. Individuals have also been able to access emergency services where by hospitals have been centralised into one system. Accident victims receive treatment until they become stable irrespective of their financial status.
Ethical issues pertaining to availability of resources In most cases it is not the availability of finances but the availability of the machines or the organ to be transplanted. In addressing ethical issues, where there are limited resources in terms of the required facilities, the U. S medical system dissolved the religious committees since it was considered to be biased. Instead a medical committee was set up which selected people for dialysis or organ transplant based on their diagnosis and availability of an organ match within the local area.
However the state has only been able to fund kidney patients leaving out other conditions or diseases due to limited resources. With reference to the 2006 Terri Schiavo politicized family dilemma, the resources would have been put into better use by using the resources on a person who had better chances of recovery. Through the computer tomography (CT) scan done six years after her diagnosis it showed that she would have never improved. Here the U. S. medical system had proved to be inefficient through inappropriate allocation of resources.