The Need for and Aim of this Book
In an April 2019 report on Americans’ biggest worries, Gallup found that “fifty-five percent of Americans worry ‘a great deal’ about the availability and affordability of healthcare.” Rapid changes in the U.S. healthcare system and escalating medical costs are causing uncertainty and financial stress for consumers.
The authors Lawrence W. Lazarus, M.D. and Jeffrey Foster, M.D. aim to help their readers become knowledgeable and active healthcare consumers and replace their anxiety with confidence. They have created a user-friendly guide to help everyone choose the highest quality healthcare and learn how to contain their out-of-pocket costs.
What Is Unique About This Book
· Authors are Physicians and also Past Presidents of a national healthcare association (AAGP)
o With decades of experience in treating patients and their families
o With decades of experience training doctors and doing research
· Endorsements from Physician, Nursing, Social Work professionals
o To help their patients to better understand the healthcare system
· Comprehensive and Practical
o Read as a book; use as a well-documented reference
o Contains many brief healthcare stories showing problems & solutions
· Closely integrated with our website--Never out of date
o All Chapters with continuing updates on our website (www.qualityaffordablehealthcare.net)
o Monitoring over 100 healthcare topics
o Additional website chapter Appendices referred to in the book
§ Provide important additional information without burdening all readers
- All chapters have Key Points for quick preview or review
Value to Healthcare Consumers
The book teaches the reader how to become a confident, knowledgeable and active healthcare consumer. How to know your choices and how to evaluate them. How to contain your costs for quality care. We monitor over 100 health sectors to regularly update chapters on our website www.qualityaffordablehealthcare.net so the book is never out of date. Join our email list for alerts when chapter updates are posted.
Quarter Finalist
Assessment:
Idea/Concept: A pair of physicians draws upon all their institutional and practical knowledge to write a frank, comprehensive, up-to-date guide for patients navigating America's healthcare system, including many lists of vital questions patients should ask their care providers, and covering the ACA, COBRA, Medicaid, and other coverage options without including a trace of politics, proving to be an immensely helpful text. The book lays out with forceful clarity the many points patients should consider before selecting a doctor or hospital, electing to undergo surgery, seeking a second opinion, or being prescribed a medication; this is an urgently necessary book.
Prose: The authors write admirably direct, clear prose that's always grammatically sound and stripped of jargon, emotion, and ambiguity. They explain key terms at every step and guide readers with strong topic sentences, helpful summaries, and clearly labeled section breaks. The lists of questions to ask healthcare providers in various circumstances are practical and helpful, as are the many bulleted lists of steps or considerations readers should make when facing healthcare decisions or waiting in an emergency room. During some longer explanatory passages, however, such as the examination of the "Good, the Bad, and the Ugly" of the Affordable Care Act, the carefully dispassionate tone does nothing to enliven dull, technical material. Fortunately, most of the book covers practical, immediate concerns.
Originality: The authors' broad advice (assemble a personal healthcare record; seek second opinions; have a personal advocate) is familiar in outline, but "Insider's Guide to Quality, Affordable Healthcare" offers much that is unique -- and uniquely helpful. The authors prove especially adept at explaining, without finger pointing, why the healthcare system is the way that it is, and how within that often dehumanizing system readers can still find wats advocate for themselves or their loved ones. Finally, the authors cover many complicated real-life situations that other general health books might not, including sections with titles like "How to Stop an Impaired Elderly Parent’s Right to Drive," "What You Can Expect If You have a Prescribed Opioid," and "What Can Be Done to Decrease Your Risk?" with regard to bacterial antibiotic resistance.
Execution: Insider's Guide to Quality, Affordable Healthcare offers exactly what its title promises. The volume is shrewdly laid out for ease of use, and it bursts with both generalized and highly specific practical advice that will likely prove beneficial to any reader.
Date Submitted: November 06, 2019
