Healthcare Reform 101 Summary

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“Healthcare Reform 101,” written by Rick Panning (2014), is a wonderful article that describes, in an easy-to-understand language, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, signed into law March 23, 2010. The main goal of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act was to provide affordable, quality healthcare to Americans while simultaneously reducing some of the country’s economic problems. Two areas will be covered throughout this paper. The first section will include a summary of the major points and highlights of Panning’s (2014) article, including an introduction to the ACA, goals of the signed legislation, provided coverage, and downfalls of the current healthcare system. The second part will be comprised of a professional …show more content…

Although the US is technologically advanced and has some of the highest caliber medical professionals in the world, compared to many other industrialized countries, it has one of the lowest outcomes in regards to quality of care. Moreover, it has some of the highest overall medical costs (Panning, 2014). In the US, low quality care and high costs have resulted in fragmentation of the healthcare delivery system. Fragmentation of services often results in patient experiences that are poor, with less than desired clinical …show more content…

Panning (2014) offers an overview of how the new legislation and its goals are both effective and flawed. Goals of the ACA include: universality, financing, cost reduction, quality improvement, and prevention and wellness (Panning, 2014). Within the context of the ACA is the expectation that the majority of Americans will be covered by health insurance. Furthermore, there should be a more reasonable distribution of cost amongst Americans, with younger and healthier Americans assuming some of the financial burden for those less healthy. Another goal of the ACA is to stabilize the skyrocketing cost of health care. One way to stabilize cost can be accomplished by reforming the way payment and reimbursement of services occurs—outcomes versus volume. A final goal of the Affordable Care Act is to provide incentives that reward wellness and preventative medicine (Panning,