Question

Short Answers

1. Until the last century-and-a-half, how much did medical practices contribute to longer life expectancies? Why? What other factors contributed to improve life expectation?
2. How are medical practices affected when large numbers of specialists are present? Why? How does this affect patient satisfaction?
3. Compare the percentage of medical costs covered by Medicare, Medicaid, and private insurance versus patient-paid cost in 2004 and 1960. How did this trend affect the cost of medical care?
4. What was the Seattle Admissions and Policy Committee? According to what criteria did they make their decision?. What did the critics say about their work?
5. How did government financial support for dialysis treatment come about? What has been the effect of dialysis on the total Medicare budget?
6. What is amniocentesis? What consequences may attend its use?

Answer 1

1.From the 1500s onward, till around the year 1800, life expectancy throughout Europe hovered between 30 and 40 years of age. Since the early 1800s, Finch writes that life expectancy at birth has doubled in a period of only 10 or so generations. Improved health care, sanitation, immunizations, access to clean running water, and better nutrition are all credited with the massive increase.

The 20th century produced such a plethora of discoveries and advances that in some ways the face of medicine changed out of all recognition. In 1901 in the United Kingdom, for instance, the life expectancy at birth, a primary indicator of the effect of health care on mortality (but also reflecting the state of health education, housing, and nutrition), was 48 years for males and 51.6 years for females. After steady increases, by the 1980s the life expectancy had reached 71.4 years for males and 77.2 years for females.

2. Though it’s hard to imagine, doctors only began regularly washing their hands before surgery in the mid-1800s. A better understanding of hygiene and the transmission of microbes has since contributed substantially to public health. Disease was still common, however, and impacted life expectancy. Parasites, typhoid, and infections like rheumatic fever and scarlet fever were all common during the 1800s, the lack awareness among people about hygiene and lack of technology and medicines and vaccines  for the pandemic diseases as well as general diseases like diabetis was another reason. lack awareness about the diet,usage of medicines and illiteracy was also a reason during that time in many countries.

other factors helped are,

• improving lifestyle
• improving diet plans
• proper ecxercises
• technological imrovement in health field
• invention of computers made diagnosis more easier
• modern invention in drugs
• industrialisation helped in fast growth of health field
• invention of vaccines
• implementation of vaccine to new born babies

All this also helped in improving life expectancy.

when large number of specialists came in medical field, quality of health field became more reliaable and strong. with this era, patients got the best treatment from the specialised practitioner.and it improve the worldwide scope for nursing field.most of the patients are very much satisfied about the specialised practitioners, people even started demanding for specialised practitioners, and started avoiding non specialised practioners.