Long Term Health Care Services Comparison

This research compares the provision of longterm health care (LTC) services for the elderly in Canada and the United States (US). The underlying ideologies and the approach to the delivery of health care services are fudamentally different in the two countries Therefore, the underlying ideologies and approaches are discussed prior considering the provision of LTC for the elderly.

UNDERLYING IDEOLOGIES, AND APPROACHES TO

THE DELIVERY OF HEALTH CARE SERVICES

The ideology underlying the Canadian health care system is universality. Universality means that all persons are entitled to identical benefits, regardless of their station in life. All Canadian polls have indicated that the Canadian population overwhelmingly supports that country's univeral health care system.

In the United States, the underlying ideology for the health care system is said to be freedom of choice. Greater significance is attached by most American politicians and by almost all American physicians to the idea that each individual is able to select her or his own physician than is attached to the concept of universality of access.

The Canadian health care system is characterized by most American politicians and almost all American physicians as aform of socialized medicine, and it is contended that socialized medicine is inconsistent with the concept of freedom of choice. Canadians, however, are free to select the physician of their choice. Poor Americans are not. Further, rec

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many of the costs. Lastly, third party fundershealth insurance 4companies and employersand individuals and families funding their own health care pay for some of the services delivered to the working poor through the process of cost shifting by health care providers (Friedman, 1982). Thus, whether the fact is recognized or not, health care services for the working poor in the US are being funded at present by all parties. The real question is not whether such services should be funded by other than the recipients, but, rather, how they should be funded to (1) provide equity in funding, (2) optimal costs, and (3) high quality health care for all persons. In Canada, a national health care insurance system is in force. In fact, of all of the the industrialized countries in the world, only the United States and the Republic of South Africa are without such systems. Health care delivery in Canada is a provincial responsibility; however, the funding for the system is shared by the provinces and the federal government, with the federal government making the largest contribution in each province. Fee schedules are established by the provincial govern ments. In the past few years, physicians in three provinces have attemp

Category: Medical - L