WHY IS THE AMERICAN HEALTH CARE SO COSTLY?

Rising health care costs are of concern to policymakers, employers, health care leaders, and insured and uninsured Americans alike. The U.S. has relied on a mixed public-private system of insurance, managed care, and market competition to shape the health care system. Yet, the U.S. has the highest health care spending per capita in the world, and during the 1990s health spending in the U.S. rose faster than in other industrialized nations.

• Health insurance premiums are rising 10 to 15 percent a year.
• Prescription drugs remain the fastest growing health care item, but acceleration in hospital costs is a troubling development.
• The rapid increase in specialized physician services under Medicare - specialist consultations, ambulatory surgeries, brain MRIs, pacemaker insertions, heart echography - raise the possibility of "physician-induced" demand.
• Administrative expenses are increasing 11.2 percent a year. Currently at $111 billion, they are projected to rise to $223 billion in 2012.
• The U.S. has a higher share of private spending (56%) than industrialized nations (average of 26%). Out-of-pocket health care spending per capita was $707 in the U.S. in 2000, more than twice the industrialized nation average ($328).
• Americans receive fewer days of hospital care than other industrialized nations, and about the same number of visits to physicians.
• Health care spending in the U.S. is higher because we pay higher prices for the same services, have higher administrative costs, and perform more complex specialized procedures.
• Sick adults in the U.S. report higher rates of medical errors, are more likely to go for duplicate tests, and are less likely to have their medical records available when they go for care compared with similar adults in other major English-speaking countries.

Due to the rising cost of health care in America, many people have started taking advantage of low cost high quality health care that is available abroad. This practice of traveling abroad for medical treatment is called medical tourism.

Source: http://www.commonwealthfund.org/publications/publications_show.htm?doc_id=221624

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Medical Tourism is the act of traveling abroad to receive medical, dental and cosmetic care. Medical Tourism is also called as Medical Travel, Health Tourism, Health Travel and Medical Value Travel. Significantly lower costs for best practice care is usually the primary motivation although some medical tourists go abroad for immediate availability of procedures and unavailable treatments. Patients frequently take advantage of the opportunity to vacation and tour inexpensively in the country they are visiting.
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WHY IS THE AMERICAN HEALTH CARE SO COSTLY?