Health Insurance In The 1970's: A Case Study

Between the late 1800’s early 1900’s, there was nothing called health insurance. The American Medical Association (AMA) was getting started and the hospitals were becoming known and established, some doctors made house calls and exchanged the services they provided for good. People were treating themselves at home for major and minor things. In that era and time there wasn’t anything similar or comparable to how things are this day and age. (Dranove, 2014).

Between the time of 1901 and during the 1940's medicine and health care made some major changes. It progressed it started to grow. The early 1930’s, Blue Shield and Kaiser began to offer coverage. According to "The Economic Evolution of Healthcare" (2014), Hospitals became very important.

HMO's were now being used, in the 1970's, healthcare cost began to go up and people started having their own coverage. Over the past 40-50 years health care costs continue to rise to the point that some low-income families and the elderly are unable to get medical treatment. (Dranove, 2014).

Over the last five or ten years, several government officials have voted for a national health care system, and on March 23, 2010, the Affordable Care Act became law. The idea is to make sure everyone is able to get medical treatment and services and bring down health care costs. The goal is to improve the delivery of medical services, fund innovative and cost-effective medical procedures, cut the costs of health insurance, improve the nation's health through prevention and better nutrition.

Many people enrolled in the HMO plans at a low rate because there was little to no copay, Share of Cost, or out of pocket deductible for medical visits and services provided. The cost was covered through the insurance, such as a Managed Medicaid Plan, or another plan, The carriers for these plans were able to determine what they wanted to pay for and and made a lot of restrictions for the more expensive services to be provided that some felt required medical justification and to be

This kind of plan is a mix between an HMO and PPO plan. The HMO has it so a referral from the PCP has to be on fil to have services performed by an out-of-network physician that is willing to bill the insurance company if they are willing too. (Dranove, 2014). The PPO part allows services between the network and out-of-network physicians with ore benefits and less restrictions. Even though the price to the person buying was higher than the previous HMO option, it was the one they were willing to pay