Access to healthcare

Access to healthcare

 Abstract

Access to health care alludes to the ease in which an individual can obtain needed medical services to achieve the best possible health outcomes. According to the National Health Interview Survey in 2018, the percentage of Americans who were uninsured was 9.4% (30.4 million). There was an improvement in contrast to 2013 before the Affordable Care Act took full effect when 13.3% were uninsured (Galewitz, 2019). Americans with private insurance are facing higher deductibles and co-payments, along with a narrowing availability of providers covered by their plan. Millions of Americans say they have skipped a needed trip to the doctor due to costs, despite a roughly 60% increase in people with health insurance (Galewitz, 2019). This paper focuses on why access to health services is essential, the emerging issues in access to health services, and the disparities of healthcare. The paper will also identify the barriers to health care and ways to improve health care services. Current peer-reviewed journal articles will be utilized to address the impact of uninsured individuals and the United State’s lack of universal health care. This paper also discusses the implementation of the American Nurses Association (ANA) Standards of practice, Quality and Safety Education for Nurses (QSEN) competencies, Healthy People 2020, and the National Patient Safety Goals as a guideline to address the problems with health care and potential solutions to them.

Keywords: healthcare access, healthcare policy, uninsured Americans, healthcare disparities, insurance coverage, universal healthcare

Objectives

Americans without health insurance have the hardest time affording care and are deciding to forgo doctor visits due to money(Millman, 1993). This leads to people waiting until injuries and illnesses reach a drastic stage before getting attention. When those that do not have health insurance go for help, they can not be turned away from hospitals. They acquire excessive hospital fees with no ability to pay them. Due to this, their hospital bills get footed by American taxpayers. Having universal healthcare for every American can curb this occurrence.

No matter how successful a particular health service may be, a good health outcome is not always guaranteed. Despite that, the most crucial consideration is whether people have the opportunity for a good result. Specific demographic of people have a hard time accessing health care, especially when medical care can make a difference in their health. When opportunities get systematically denied to specific groups in society, there is an access problem that needs to be addressed (Millman, 1993). Monitoring access to health care can detect where access problems occur in the health care system. Monitoring may not explain the causes but can provide a better basis for generating theories about why these differences exist among populations.

Access to health care affects one’s overall physical, social, mental health status, and quality of life. Barriers to health services include:

• The high cost of care
• Inadequate or no insurance coverage
• Lack of availability of services
• Lack of culturally competent care

As stated by Healthy people 2020, access to care alters based on socioeconomic status, race, age, sex, disability status, sexual orientation, ethnicity, gender identity, and residential location. Disparities exist based on geographical location; millions of Americans living in rural areas lack access to primary care services due to a lack in the workforce. Efforts will need to focus on better distribution of primary care workers that are trained to provide culturally competent care to varied populations.

Alternatives methods may need to be implemented to improve access to care for millions of Americans struggling. The use of the internet, informatics, and technology is increasing to help workers quickly and proficiently provide the needed attention to their patients. Telehealth and remote patient monitoring should be used more extensively within the health care system. According to the American Medical Association (AMA), it will become an essential, reliable, and cost-effective way to increase capacity in a health system marked by significant and persistent specialty shortages and geographic disparities.

Addressing physician shortages and increasing the efficiency of the existing workforce can dramatically improve health care access. American Medical Association (AMA) also states that we can increase clinical personnel by:

•  expanding the number of available graduate medical education residency positions
• expanding medical school loan-forgiveness programs
• removing barriers to physician immigration for foreign-trained physicians to practice in the U.S.

Efficiency can be increased by introducing medical liability reforms and reducing government and insurance industry regulatory burdens that increase costs while minimizing patient care (Bhatt & Bathija, 2018).

Introduction

Access to health care is a topic that has ended friendships, relationships, and even marriages. Why is something so simple controversial and problematic? Access to healthcare may seem like every human’s right, but over the years, many have a problem getting coverage.

The only industrialized country that does not guarantee its citizens access to medical services is the United States, which is very peculiar for a nation built on human rights and liberty. Many in our government argue that health care should be private, not universal, with a public safety net used as a last resort only (Douthit et al., 2015). Voluntary private health insurance has been used for the answer to covering medical expenses. Still, the problem is that nearly half of all employers choose not to offer health insurance to their employees. As a result, most of the 40 million Americans who lack health insurance are workers or their dependents (Light, 2002).

According to Healthy People 2020; Access to extensive comprehensive, quality health care services is vital for reducing unnecessary disability and premature death, promoting and maintaining health, and preventing and managing disease and achieving health equity for all Americans. Health care access is a human necessity that needs to be a topic of focus in the United States. Causes for health disparities should be identified, and enacting universal health care, decreasing health care barriers and inequalities, and increasing availability for citizens to access care should be implemented.