A vivid account of race and the organization of health services

The United States’ health care system stands out for its strict division of policies dealing with public health and individual medicine. Seeking to explain how this division came to be, what alternative paths might have been taken, and how this shapes the contemporary landscape, Daniel Sledge offers nothing less than a reinterpretation of the making of modern American health policy in Health Divided. Where previous scholars have focused on failed attempts to adopt national health insurance, Sledge demonstrates that the development of health policy cannot be properly understood without considering the connections between public health policy and policies dealing with individual medicine. His work shows how the distinct politics of the formative years of health policy—and the presence of debilitating diseases in the American South—led to outcomes that have fundamentally shaped modern policies and disputes. Until the end of the nineteenth century, health care in the United States was seen as a local issue, with the sole exception being the government’s role in providing care to seamen and immigrants. Then, as Health Divided reveals, the health problems that plagued the American South in the early twentieth century, from malaria to hookworm and pellagra, along with the political power of the southern Democrats during the New Deal, fueled the emergence of national intervention in public health work. At the same time, divisions among policymakers, as well as the resistance of the American Medical Association, led to federal inaction in the realm of individual medical services—setting the stage for the growth of employer-sponsored health insurance. The vision of those who built the institutions that became the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention was, we see here, far more expansive and innovative than has previously been realized—and it came surprisingly close to succeeding. Exploring the history behind its failure, and tracing the inextricable links between public health and national health policy, this book provides a valuable new perspective on the origins of America’s disjointed health care system.

In 1996, the Institute of Medicine (IOM) released its report Telemedicine: A Guide to Assessing Telecommunications for Health Care. In that report, the IOM Committee on Evaluating Clinical Applications of Telemedicine found telemedicine is similar in most respects to other technologies for which better evidence of effectiveness is also being demanded. Telemedicine, however, has some special characteristics-shared with information technologies generally-that warrant particular notice from evaluators and decision makers. Since that time, attention to telehealth has continued to grow in both the public and private sectors. Peer-reviewed journals and professional societies are devoted to telehealth, the federal government provides grant funding to promote the use of telehealth, and the private technology industry continues to develop new applications for telehealth. However, barriers remain to the use of telehealth modalities, including issues related to reimbursement, licensure, workforce, and costs. Also, some areas of telehealth have developed a stronger evidence base than others. The Health Resources and Service Administration (HRSA) sponsored the IOM in holding a workshop in Washington, DC, on August 8-9 2012, to examine how the use of telehealth technology can fit into the U.S. health care system. HRSA asked the IOM to focus on the potential for telehealth to serve geographically isolated individuals and extend the reach of scarce resources while also emphasizing the quality and value in the delivery of health care services. This workshop summary discusses the evolution of telehealth since 1996, including the increasing role of the private sector, policies that have promoted or delayed the use of telehealth, and consumer acceptance of telehealth. The Role of Telehealth in an Evolving Health Care Environment: Workshop Summary discusses the current evidence base for telehealth, including available data and gaps in data; discuss how technological developments, including mobile telehealth, electronic intensive care units, remote monitoring, social networking, and wearable devices, in conjunction with the push for electronic health records, is changing the delivery of health care in rural and urban environments. This report also summarizes actions that the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) can undertake to further the use of telehealth to improve health care outcomes while controlling costs in the current health care environment.

"The Nation has lost sight of its public health goals and has allowed the system of public health to fall into 'disarray'," from The Future of Public Health. This startling book contains proposals for ensuring that public health service programs are efficient and effective enough to deal not only with the topics of today, but also with those of tomorrow. In addition, the authors make recommendations for core functions in public health assessment, policy development, and service assurances, and identify the level of government--federal, state, and local--at which these functions would best be handled.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) in Healthcare is more than a comprehensive introduction to artificial intelligence as a tool in the generation and analysis of healthcare data. The book is split into two sections where the first section describes the current healthcare challenges and the rise of AI in this arena. The ten following chapters are written by specialists in each area, covering the whole healthcare ecosystem. First, the AI applications in drug design and drug development are presented followed by its applications in the field of cancer diagnostics, treatment and medical imaging. Subsequently, the application of AI in medical devices and surgery are covered as well as remote patient monitoring. Finally, the book dives into the topics of security, privacy, information sharing, health insurances and legal aspects of AI in healthcare. - Highlights different data techniques in healthcare data analysis, including machine learning and data mining - Illustrates different applications and challenges across the design, implementation and management of intelligent systems and healthcare data networks - Includes applications and case studies across all areas of AI in healthcare data

A profound and insightful investigation into how the American Civil War transformed modern medicine. At the start of the Civil War, the medical field in America was rudimentary, unsanitary, and woefully underprepared to address what would become the bloodiest conflict on U.S. soil. However, in this historic moment of pivotal social and political change, medicine was also fast evolving to meet the needs of the time. Unprecedented strides were made in the science of medicine, and as women and African Americans were admitted into the field for the first time. The Civil War marked a revolution in healthcare as a whole, laying the foundations for the system we know today. In Healing a Divided Nation, Carole Adrienne will track this remarkable and bloody transformation in its cultural and historical context, illustrating how the advancements made in these four years reverberated throughout the western world for years to come. Analyzing the changes in education, society, humanitarianism, and technology in addition to the scientific strides of the period lends Healing a Divided Nation a uniquely wide lens to the topic, expanding the legacy of the developments made. The echoes of Civil War medicine are in every ambulance, every vaccination, every woman who holds a paying job, and in every Black university graduate. Those echoes are in every response of the International and American Red Cross and they are in the recommended international protocol for the treatment of prisoners of war and wounded soldiers. Beginning with the state of medicine at the outset of the war, when doctors did not even know about sterilizing their tools, Adrienne illuminates the transformation in American healthcare through primary source texts that document the lives and achievements of the individuals who pioneered these changes in medicine and society. The story that ensues is one of American innovation and resilience in the face of unparalleled violence, adding a new dimension to the legacy of the Civil War.