Sample Answer for NURS 8100 Health Care Reform Included After Question
The PPACA of 2010 fostered new provisions for health care and the structure of health care delivery. The individual mandate to obtain insurance is one provocative provision. While this provision attempts to increase access to health care, it raises questions on how the existing system could sustain the potentially large influx of newly insured individuals.
Another provision calls for new models of health care provider organizations to ensure delivery efficiency and continuity of care. In this week’s media presentation, Dr. Kathleen White discusses the accountable care organization, which comprises a group of providers coordinating care across a variety of institutional settings. Yet becoming an accountable care organization may present a number of challenges.
This week’s Discussion builds on Week 1, continuing the examination of those societal and organizational contexts that influence health care reform. The unintended consequences of reform policy on the health care system are also considered.
To prepare:
- Review this week’s media presentation and the other Learning Resources focusing on how reform may lead to improved quality, greater access, and reduced cost of care. Also think about the unintended consequences that may arise as a result.
- Consider the information presented about the individual mandate and accountable care organizations. What are some questions or concerns you might have regarding the individual mandate? What are the pros and cons associated with becoming an accountable care organization?
- With posting instructions in mind, select either the individual mandate or accountable care organizations as the focus of your Discussion this week.
By Day 3
Post a cohesive response that addresses the following:
- In the first line of your posting, identify the topic you have selected—either the individual mandate or accountable care organizations. With regard to this topic, describe one or more positive results that could be achieved, and one or more unintended consequence(s) that organizations or individuals may experience.
- Briefly evaluate issues on the topic that may be a consideration for the organization you work in and the nursing profession.
Read a selection of your colleagues’ postings.
By Day 6
Respond to at least two of your colleagues in one or more of the following ways:
- Ask a probing question, substantiated with additional background information, evidence or research.
- Share an insight from having read your colleagues’ postings, synthesizing the information to provide new perspectives.
- Offer and support an alternative perspective using readings from the classroom or from your own research in the Walden Library.
- Validate an idea with your own experience and additional research.
- Make a suggestion based on additional evidence drawn from readings or after synthesizing multiple postings.
- Expand on your colleagues’ postings by providing additional insights or contrasting perspectives based on readings and evidence.
Note: Please see the Syllabus and Discussion Rubric for formal Discussion question posting and response evaluation criteria.
Return to this Discussion in a few days to read the responses to your initial posting. Note what you learned and/or any insights you gained as a result of the comments made by your colleagues.
Be sure to support your work with specific citations from this week’s Learning Resources and any additional sources.
A Sample Answer For the Assignment: NURS 8100 Health Care Reform
Title: NURS 8100 Health Care Reform
Feature of the Health Care System
One feature of the US health care system is that it is the most expensive healthcare in the world with results that would not agree with the cost. It is interesting to see that the US healthcare system has tried to evolve over the years and in that evolving has actually increased the cost of healthcare (Bodenheimer & Grumbach, 2020). Competition has fueled the improvement of healthcare, but at the cost of raising healthcare costs for the individual. There are other countries that have better health care systems in place, for a fraction of the cost. It would be interesting to investigate the actual cost of care and how much insurance companies gain compared to their actual payout. There is much that could be improved in the US health care system. It could be possible that the monetary issues prevent there from being major reform to the system because companies make such a large sum of money that they do not want things to change. As the US health care system has tried to change and become seemingly more affordable through the use of policy changes there has been an increase in the amount of money that they government pays, which is actually paid by US citizens through taxes (Bodenheimer & Grumbach, 2020). It seems that whenever the US health care system is taking one step forward it is also taking two steps back.
Challenges
The Affordable Care Act (ACA) did provide more individuals with health care coverage. This has improved the health of many individuals. One condition of the ACA is that it protects individuals with preexisting conditions from insurance companies denying care based on their condition (Healthcare.gov, n.d.). This is a great benefit for many individuals, but it comes at a cost for the insurance companies. This mandatory coverage causes insurance companies to then have to try to balance out coverage for those individuals that are ill versus those individuals who are healthy which can end up costing those individuals that are healthy to pay for others in their groups (Bodenheimer & Grumbach, 2020). This causes insurances to have to base their premiums on an experience rating versus a community rating which potentially provides unfair coverage to individuals (Bodenhemier & Grumbach, 2020). This seemingly minor change from the ACA has a ripple effect in the way that insurance companies need to charge for care and how they will determine premiums for individuals. The ACA in general is an example of how the policy making process is in the United States. Making or changing policy in the United States is a very slow, very incremental process which makes it hard to change or add policies (Walden University, LLC, 2011). The ACA was a worked on for a long time and because of the changes that were made many companies had to adjust accordingly. Health reform in the United States is difficult because there are so many entities that want to make sure that they are not being left out or hurt in decisions or policies that are being made and so they will stall or stonewall different policies if they feel that it does not benefit them. When there are policy changes then there are adjustments that need to be made and sometimes that effects so many different things that the changes end up being a negative instead of a positive, such as individuals who have to pay too much for the ACA healthcare and therefore opt out and are fined for that decision (Bodenheim & Grumbach, 2020).
References
Bodenheimer, T., & Grumbach, K. (2020). Understanding health policy: A clinical approach (8th ed.). McGraw-Hill.
HealthCare.gov. (n.d.) Understanding the Affordable Care Act. Retrieved from https://www.hhs.gov/healthcare/about-the-aca/index.html
Walden University, LLC. (Executive Producer). (2011). Healthcare policy and advocacy: The policy process. Baltimore: Author.
A Sample Answer 2 For the Assignment: NURS 8100 Health Care Reform
Title: NURS 8100 Health Care Reform
It is true that the US healthcare systems have been evolving. The evolution aims at making healthcare services more suitable due to the emerging healthcare conditions. Unfortunately, the evolution has made the cost of healthcare shoot (Wosik et al., 2020). Surprisingly, most uninsured Americans are now struggling to afford hiked medication bills. The advanced healthcare services that focused on making healthcare quality and patient satisfaction have turned into a nightmare for most Americans who cannot afford it. The introduction of the ACA and Medicaid programs are intervention mechanisms from the federal and the national governments. Most American politicians understand the ramifications of the changes in the US healthcare system and the entire sector (Tran et al., 2019). Therefore, to avoid the increased inability of Americans to access quality healthcare services have forced the authority to intervene through insurance programs. Also, the policy change in the healthcare sector is targeting the most vulnerable Americans. People living with disability and the elderly population is among the targeted population. Similarly, the government programs consider both the underemployed and unemployed Americans.
References
Tran, B. X., Vu, G. T., Ha, G. H., Vuong, Q. H., Ho, M. T., Vuong, T. T., … & Ho, R. (2019). Global evolution of research in artificial intelligence in health and medicine: a bibliometric study. Journal of clinical medicine, 8(3), 360. https://doi.org/10.3390/jcm8030360
Wosik, J., Fudim, M., Cameron, B., Gellad, Z. F., Cho, A., Phinney, D., … & Tcheng, J. (2020). Telehealth transformation: COVID-19 and the rise of virtual care. Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association, 27(6), 957-962. https://doi.org/10.1093/jamia/ocaa067
After much public and political debate, in March 2010, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) was signed into law by President Barack Obama. The PPACA is one of many health care reform efforts that have sought to correct key features of the U.S. health care system such as financing, service delivery, and care coordination. This week, you will examine the passage of PPACA as a milestone along the historical continuum of health care reform in the United States.
To prepare:
- Review this week’s Learning Resources and media presentation, reflecting on the evolution of health care in the United States and the public’s response to health care reform efforts historically and currently.
- Consider: What principal features of the U.S. health care system helped or hindered the enactment of federal health reform in March 2010? What challenges were encountered?
- How do these conditions and/or challenges reflect characteristics of the policy process and the political environment?
By Day 3
Post a cohesive response that addresses the following:
- Analyze at least one important feature of the U.S. health care system that is of particular interest to you. Explain why you think this feature is significant in terms of health policy and reform.
- Describe one or more conditions or challenges specifically related to the passing of the PPACA. Explain how this exemplifies the nature of the policy-making process, and evaluate how it could relate to the question of why health reform in the United States has been so difficult.
Read a selection of your colleagues’ postings.
By Day 6
Respond to at least two of your colleagues in one or more of the following ways:
- Ask a probing question, substantiated with additional background information, evidence or research.
- Share an insight from having read your colleagues’ postings, synthesizing the information to provide new perspectives.
- Offer and support an alternative perspective using readings from the classroom or from your own research in the Walden Library.
- Validate an idea with your own experience and additional research.
- Make a suggestion based on additional evidence drawn from readings or after synthesizing multiple postings.
- Expand on your colleagues’ postings by providing additional insights or contrasting perspectives based on readings and evidence.
Note: Please see the Syllabus and Discussion Rubric for formal Discussion question posting and response evaluation criteria.
Return to this Discussion in a few days to read the responses to your initial posting. Note what you learned and/or any insights you gained as a result of the comments made by your colleagues.
Be sure to support your work with specific citations from this week’s Learning Resources and any additional sources.
A Sample Answer 3 For the Assignment: NURS 8100 Health Care Reform
Title: NURS 8100 Health Care Reform
This is an exceptional work on health care reform. I concur with you that cost of care is an important feature of health care system that has great influence on the health policy and reforms. Other than the cost, the other important feature of the US health care system is politics. Politics play a crucial role in the health care affairs, particularly health policy and reforms (Tuohy, 2018). The health care reform discussion in the US has been a political issue centered on reduction of cost, funding, increasing medical coverage, insurance reform, government involvement, and philosophy of its provision.
Health care reforms have been highly contentious among law makers (Haeder, 2020). For instance, President Obama enacted the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) to increase health coverage to all Americans. However, the Trump administration consistently made efforts to repeal the ACA and adopt alternative policy called repeal and replace approach. This effort to repeal the ACA has been a controversial political topic among the Democrats and Republicans in the Congress (Michener, 2020).
References
Haeder, S. F. (2020). Political science and US health policy in the era of the affordable care act. Policy Studies Journal, 48, S14-S32. https://doi.org/10.1111/psj.12385
Michener, J. (2020). Race, politics, and the affordable care act. Journal of Health Politics, Policy and Law, 45(4), 547-566. https://doi.org/10.1215/03616878-8255481
Tuohy, C. H. (2018). Remaking policy: scale, pace, and political strategy in Health care reform (Vol. 54). University of Toronto Press.
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A Sample Answer 4 For the Assignment: NURS 8100 Health Care Reform
Title: NURS 8100 Health Care Reform
The Affordable Care Act (ACA) was signed into law over 10 years ago and it has remained highly controversial by many law makers since its inception on March 23, 2010. Many law makers have tried to get rid of the ACA but have yet to find a health care system to replace the ACA that works with law makers and the public. Even though people may not like the ACA it has improved the health care system, provided health insurance to the uninsured, provided more prevention program to help improve the overall health of the American people. There was so much resistance to passing the ACA since the President at that time was African American and a Democratic (Silberman, 2020).
The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) was passed by a Democratic Congress and signed into law by a Democratic president in 2010. Republican congresspeople, governors, and Republican candidates have consistently opposed the ACA and have vowed to repeal it during every election, but more than 50% of Americans support ACA. In the first year of ACA 10 million Americans gained accessed to health insurance. The ACA also eliminated the no coverage for prior conditions, it also decreased prescription drug cost and eliminated co-pay for preventive services. When people are asked why they oppose the ACA they mention they do not like the government involved in their healthcare, but they pay into Medicare which is a mandatory federal government insurance.
Despite positive changes the ACA has brought to many Americans many politicians and people oppose ACA and want to get rid of ACA(Silberman,2020). While ACA has made great strides in improving health care, health disparity remains a major problem among people of color. The recent pandemic has shown the world once again that the health care system is even though Black Americans make up 13 percent of the US population over 23 percent of COVID deaths were Black Americans (USA, 2021).
In spite of significant advances in the diagnosis and treatment of most chronic diseases, there is evidence that racial and ethnic minorities tend to receive lower quality of care than non-minorities and that, patients of minority ethnicity experience greater morbidity and mortality from various chronic diseases than non-minorities. The Institute of Medicine (IOM) report from 2006 showed unequal treatment “racial and ethnic disparities in healthcare exist and, because that lead to worse outcomes in many cases. Minorities were provided less access to health care intervention, sources, and funding (Egede, 2006).
References
Egede, L. (2006). Race, Ethnicity, Culture, and Disparities in Health care
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1924616/
Silberman, P. (2020). The Affordable Care Act: Against the Odds, It’s Working. North Carolina Medical Journal, 81(6), 364–369. https://doi-org.ezp.waldenulibrary.org/10.18043/ncm.81.6.364
USA FACTS. (2021).US COVID-19 cases and deaths by state
https://usafacts.org/visualizations/coronavirus-covid-19-spread-map/
A Sample Answer 5 For the Assignment: NURS 8100 Health Care Reform
Title: NURS 8100 Health Care Reform
Your work on health care reform is insightful and interesting. Indeed, politics is playing an important role in the US health care reforms and PPACA has remained controversial issue due to political differences. The other challenge related to the passing of the PPACA is healthcare inequalities, which has disproportionately impacted the minority groups such as African Americans and marginalized groups (Yue et al., 2018). While the PPACA coverage increased the progress towards universal coverage, the persistent high cost of various coverage options implies limited access to affordable health care among many Americans, especially the minority and marginalized groups (Gaffney & McCormick, 2017).
These disparities lead to the gaps in health insurance coverage, poor health outcomes among minority and marginalized groups, and unequal access to services (Dickman et al., 2017). The issue of healthcare inequalities and other challenges portray why health care reforms in the US have been difficult. They characterize systematic health care challenges that indicate that the US health care reforms are not comprehensive and fail to capture the health care needs of all Americans.
References
Dickman, S. L., Himmelstein, D. U., & Woolhandler, S. (2017). Inequality and the health-care system in the USA. The Lancet, 389(10077), 1431-1441. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(17)30398-7
Gaffney, A., & McCormick, D. (2017). The Affordable Care Act: implications for health-care equity. The Lancet, 389(10077), 1442-1452. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(17)30786-9
Yue, D., Rasmussen, P. W., & Ponce, N. A. (2018). Racial/ethnic differential effects of Medicaid expansion on health care access. Health services research, 53(5), 3640-3656. https://doi.org/10.1111/1475-6773.12834
A Sample Answer 6 For the Assignment: NURS 8100 Health Care Reform
Title: NURS 8100 Health Care Reform
The Affordable Care Act (ACA) was signed into law over 10 years ago and it has remained highly controversial by many law makers since its inception on March 23, 2010. Many law makers have tried to get rid of the ACA but have yet to find a health care system to replace the ACA that works with law makers and the public. Even though people may not like the ACA it has improved the health care system, provided health insurance to the uninsured, provided more prevention program to help improve the overall health of the American people.
There was so much resistance to passing the ACA since the President at that time was African American and a Democratic (Silberman, 2020). The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) was passed by a Democratic Congress and signed into law by a Democratic president in 2010. Republican congresspeople, governors, and Republican candidates have consistently opposed the ACA and have vowed to repeal it during every election, but more than 50% of Americans support ACA. In the first year of ACA 10 million Americans gained accessed to health insurance.
The ACA also eliminated the no coverage for prior conditions, it also decreased prescription drug cost and eliminated co-pay for preventive services. When people are asked why they oppose the ACA they mention they do not like the government involved in their healthcare, but they pay into Medicare which is a mandatory federal government insurance. Despite positive changes the ACA has brought to many Americans many politicians and people oppose ACA and want to get rid of ACA(Silberman,2020). While ACA has made great strides in improving health care, health disparity remains a major problem among people of color. The recent pandemic has shown the world once again that the health care system is even though Black Americans make up 13 percent of the US population over 23 percent of COVID deaths were Black Americans (USA, 2021).
In spite of significant advances in the diagnosis and treatment of most chronic diseases, there is evidence that racial and ethnic minorities tend to receive lower quality of care than non-minorities and that, patients of minority ethnicity experience greater morbidity and mortality from various chronic diseases than non-minorities. The Institute of Medicine (IOM) report from 2006 showed unequal treatment “racial and ethnic disparities in healthcare exist and, because that lead to worse outcomes in many cases. Minorities were provided less access to health care intervention, sources, and funding (Egede, 2006).
References
Egede, L. (2006). Race, Ethnicity, Culture, and Disparities in Health care
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1924616/
Silberman, P. (2020). The Affordable Care Act: Against the Odds, It’s Working. North Carolina Medical Journal, 81(6), 364–369. https://doi-org.ezp.waldenulibrary.org/10.18043/ncm.81.6.364
USA FACTS. (2021).US COVID-19 cases and deaths by state
https://usafacts.org/visualizations/coronavirus-covid-19-spread-map/