How Do We Harm

The healthy people initiative of the Federal American government was designed and maintained not as an initiative from the federal government but as a national initiative. Consequently, this elicited contribution from the National NGOs, professional state health agencies, health and other multiple agencies that are connected to the American Health Department (Green & Fielding 2011, para. 2). This has made various local and state stakeholders to engage in efforts that enact and assess the health program in the US.

This has resulted in an emerging trend that is distinct towards the combination of both alternative and complementary medicine (CAM) therapies with conventional medicine practice. Many hospitals, health maintenance Organizations and various insurance covers are now offering these CAM therapies (Green & Fielding 2011, para. 4). Conventional medicine tests and treatment have been able to go through various scientific obstacles to become part of the medical practice in America today.

This essay reviews a text dubbed, “How do we do harm,” by Otis Brawley. I chose this book because it depicts the negative aspects of the health care system in America. The writer of this book is an expert in the health care field system. The author, Dr. Otis Brawley, is the Chief Medical and scientific officer of the American Cancer Society since the fiscal year 2007. This means that the author is qualified to discuss issues affecting the health system in America. Furthermore, being a medical practitioner, he is able to point out the various issues that the health care system is experiencing in America.

The information in this book impacted my life in a number of ways. It opened my eyes to the realization of how mediocre that American health system is mediocre despite the fact that it is very costly. I saw the medical field from the perspective of a medical practitioner. The author rebukes doctors and other medical practitioners for being lazy intellectually and ignorant (Brawley & Goldberg 2012, 241). Consequently, this has resulted to mediocre medicine being practiced in America. I know understood why the US has been ranked as the 45^th country in the world that has infant mortality rate. It’s because the health care system has been infiltrated by medical practitioners, pharmaceutical industries and other professional medical societies.

The book describes the impact that politics has on the health care system. In the book, the author employs the hospital that he works in to depict the state of the healthcare system in America. The author describes the segregation that exists in the hospital. Because of the American health care policies, there is a gap between the rich and the poor in the hospital. This makes the poor population more vulnerable to lack of medical services (Brawley & Goldberg 2012, 161). This is true as I had a close friend who could not be able to access medical services simply because he lacked insurance cover. The health insurance policies have resulted in a gap between those who survive the cancer treatment and those who don’t. He gives an example that people who have no insurance cover or those who are covered by Medicaid are more likely to die from cancer in the next five year of being diagnosed from the ailment. Furthermore, more and more Americans with cancer are delaying to carry out their treatment and testing. This is because of the high costs of health care in America.

I have two other sources that back up the arguments from the book that I have chosen to review. In a book dubbed, “Redefining Health care: Creating value based competition and results”, by Michael Poter and Elizabeth Olmsted, the health care system in America is illustrated. The book confirms the fact on how the American health care system has deteriorated. The system is plagued with inequality that is uneven, restricted access to healthcare and high medical costs (Porter & Teisberg 2006, 3). In another article written by the New York Times, the state of the American health care system is depicted. Because of poor government policies on the health care system, more Americans are suffering from the mediocre performance of the healthcare system. The article shows a survey that was carried out to compare the health care systems of different nation states. The research found out that the Americans system is rated poorly compared to other nation states (Editorial 2007, para.1). Most Americans feel that there is a need to change how business is carried out in the US.

The information that I have received for the book will affect my actions in many ways. It has opened my eyes to see the various ways in which I can give healthcare services with excellence to patients. The core message of this book was how I can be able to assist patients to access healthcare services despite their financial backgrounds. In addition, I would study more on better health care practices to ensure that I give excellent services to all patients.