buy custom Consequences of the Uninsured Problem essay

buy custom Consequences of the Uninsured Problem essay Introduction Health insurance has a lot of benefits, not only to a working population but also to employers, government, as well as hospitals and doctors. Having a health insurance policy ensures that the individuals along with their families are provided with access to quality medical care, such that they can be taken through preventive measures like immunization, maintenance procedures like frequent medical checkups, and early diagnosis to prevent chronic diseases that can be cured if detected early. All these would imply less health care costs incurred by the hospitals and doctors, as early diagnosis prevents the high cost emergency treatments for most conditions. The government also ends up having to spend less money on health care and the employers and their employees pay lower premiums for their cost sharing insurance arrangements. Generally, everyone is covered when there is adequate health insurance coverage. The other side of that story is, however, not as good. The Problem Statement Gruber (2008) reckons that being uninsured implies that ones access to health care facilities is heavily hampered; it leads to cases when people get to a doctor when their health is severely deteriorated, requiring emergency primary care. This means that there are no preventive or maintenance measures, and the possibility that they cannot afford the cost of this care is also real. The expense is thus transferred to the hospital, the government and the insurance policy holders as the premiums get hiked to cover the rising costs of health care. When the uninsured persons are employed, it means they will be unhealthy and thus fail to report to work for a given number of days. Considering that their illness could have been prevented through vaccination or treated early as a minor problem if caught during a frequent medical checkup, this loss of working days is totally unnecessary and often costs the employer a lot in terms of time and money. Impacts of the Uninsured Issue on Various Stakeholders The major stakeholders in the uninsured issue are hospitals, government, employers, patients, physicians and insurers (Ziller, Coburn Youseflan, 2006). All of these groups are exposed by the uninsured issue in one way or another as discussed below. Hospitals often take in the severe cases that need primary care in the emergency department. This is often very expensive in that the cases brought in by the uninsured tend to be preventable or treatable at a relatively cheaper cost, if diagnosed early. The fact that these individuals do not have access to preventive measures and maintenance procedures leaves them vulnerable to conditions that are not only treatable, but also very preventable. Hospitals are typically responsible for the costs incurred in their emergency departments and thus the uninsured hike these costs (Ziller, Coburn Youseflan, 2006). Also, the high numbers of the uninsured populations in the US implies that these hospitals have a heavy work load in the emergency department. More often than not, this compromises the quality of health care that can be availed by these hospitals, unless the funding is matched to the demand. As more uninsured persons seek health care, more funding is required to sustain the quality of the health services at an acceptable level. The government is partially responsible for funding the health sector, and with so many uninsured individuals the budget is bound to be high. Hospitals cannot run without adequate funding and thus the government needs to cover the deficit if the quality of health care is to be maintained (Sered Fernandopulle, 2008). Also, when an uninsured person checks in to a hospital in a critical state and is later on proven unable to cover their bills, the government has to absorb this cost to cushion the hospitals. The physicians also suffer from the uninsured issue, as they have to deal with emergency cases that are treaatable if diagnosed early or even preventable if the patient has access to routine medical checkups and other preventive measures like vaccination. The high uninsured populations also ensure that the physicists have too much work in the emergency departments. It also frustrates them, given the lives that could have been saved and yet end up being lost as a result of delayed medical attention. It can thus be stated that from the physicists perspective, the uninsured issue increases the cost of health care with regards to the high number of patients they have to deal with, compromises the quality of service, as they have to work longer hours and limits access as there are always too many patients seeking their attention in the emergency room for conditions that should have been diagnosed and treated early as minor conditions, or prevented through immunization. For the insured patients, the uninsured issue increases the cost of insurance as the health care costs go up. They are thus forced to pay higher than normal premiums in order to ensure that the hospitals can maintain the quality of care that they are accustomed to. Also, the fact that there are often many cases in the emergency department implies that these insured patients are unable to access their physicists when they have real emergencies to deal with. For the uninsured, the impact is limited access to health care, high cost of health care at the emergency department and, in some cases, poor quality treatment given that the physicians are overloaded at the emergency department. Employers use health insurance as a motivational package to attract and retain a skilled workforce. However, over 80% of the uninsured population is employed or from a working family (Marwick, 2012). This implies that there are a number of employers who do not provide medical insurance coverage for their employees even on a cost sharing basis and yet an employment-based insurance is the most common and convenient one. Having uninsured employees results in too many cases of sick leaves, as well as low employee retention. Buy custom Consequences of the Uninsured Problem essay