ROBERT L. MCCARTHY AND KENNETH W. SCHAFER-- MEYER. Introduction to Health Care Delivery: A Primer for Pharmacists, Second Edition. Gaithersburg, AM: Aspen Publishers, Inc., 2000. xvii + 599 pp., 22 figs., 32 tbls. $51.00.
The second edition of this text continues to provide an excellent overview of the United States health care system from the pharmacist's perspective. Several important changes were made since the first edition was published in 1998. First, many of the book's references have been updated and are quite current. Second, nearly every chapter begins with a pharmacy case study that is referred to within that chapter. Pharmacy students who may not always understand how management, public policy, world economics, etc. impact their own practice can easily grasp the situation in the case, then reflect how the chapter's topic may affect the practice of pharmacy. Third, this edition includes six new chapters and is arranged somewhat differently than the first edition. This text is divided into three major topic areas that take the reader through a brief historical review through numerous public policy changes in the 19th and 20th centuries to the current economic systems in health care today.
Part I, entitled, 'Social Aspects of Health Care Delivery,' consists of seven chapters. This section contains discussions of the history of health care in America, other health care professions involved in interdisciplinary care, the pharmacy profession, the patient, public health, drug use and the pharmaceutical sector, and health care ethics. This section gives the reader an excellent idea of how medical care evolved in the United States and how the ethical practice of pharmacy and use of medications fits into total patient care. Two new chapters in Part I are devoted to 'The Pharmacist' which includes a discussion on pharmaceutical care and 'The Patient' which describes the patient as a consumer of health care as well as presenting different patient care models.
Seven chapters make up Part II, 'Organizational Aspects of Health Care Delivery.' This portion of the text contains information about hospitals, ambulatory care, long-term care, mental health services, home care, health care informatics, and international health care. The new chapter in this section concerns how health care informatics provide insight into use of the internet, computer based patient data, automation, and computer aided monitoring devices.
Part III, 'Economic Aspects of Health Care Delivery,' consists of eight chapters that ranges from a review of basic economics to the description of financing for various populations in the U.S. health care system. Topics include basic economic principles, unique aspects of health economics, pharmacoeconomics, private health insurance, Medicare, Medicaid, managed health care, and health care reform. New topics for this edition involve economics and how economics in the health care system follow basic economic principles with an ethical twist. The four basic methodologies of pharmacoeconomics are described with an excellent definition of terminology for the beginning student. The last chapter, entitled, 'Health Care Reform,' discusses past and current financing of the U.S. health care system as well as what the future might hold.
Like the first edition, the second edition offers the student considering a career in pharmacy or another health related field an excellent overview of the practice of pharmacy in the U.S. health care system. Where we were in the past, what pharmacists currently accomplish, and what the profession hopes to build for the future are all described. Further, the senior pharmacy student will profit from a better understand of how pharmacy practice, economics, and general health intertwine in a health care system with many viewpoints and many players. I would continue to recommend this book as an addition to pharmacy libraries of all students and suggest it for incorporation in courses for pharmacy administration and introduction to pharmacy practice.
[Author Affiliation]
Kimberly Broedel-Zaugg Ohio Northern University
