Best health policy books according to redditors
We found 27 Reddit comments discussing the best health policy books. We ranked the 12 resulting products by number of redditors who mentioned them. Here are the top 20.
We found 27 Reddit comments discussing the best health policy books. We ranked the 12 resulting products by number of redditors who mentioned them. Here are the top 20.
How does the healthcare system here work? Honestly, from my brief foray as a graduating medical student in the medical hotbed of the US - not well. Don't come here unless you like longer hours, shorter vacations, little bargaining power, and having to practice defensive medicine.... while watching the poor and underinsured get destroyed in a heartless, wasteful, insurance-industry-driven healthcare system. That is, unless you're in one of the particularly-lucrative subspecialties with as little contact as possible with the realities of primary care.
Beyond that editorial, I would suggest reading the short book called 'Understanding Health Policy.'
It's current, and tells you all you need to know about the US system. It was compulsory for my med school class. You'll get a better answer there to your questions than somebody's anecdotes, as this country is too huge to fully summarize through one success or one failure.
PS The weather in the Pacific northwest is a lot like the UK's - rainy, cloudy, and mild.
Edit: oh, damn. Sorry, I'm not a doc yet, hahaha. Totally missed that. Well, I guess it stays...
Dude, only 38% of spending on pharmaceuticals in Canada is public, whereas in France it's 67%, and in Germany it's 75% (don't know about U.S., sorry). Source: this, page 11.
When Breath Becomes Air - Paul Kalanithi
Being Mortal - Atul Gawande
Better - Atul Gawande
Honestly anything by Atul Gawande
Start With Why- Simon Sinek (Just finished this one today. Phenomenal read. Not medicine related, but a great perspective on what leadership means and how you can inspire those around you)
The White Coat Investor - James Dahle (Financial literacy is always a good thing)
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I have quite a bit more book suggestions if you're ever curious, but those should keep you busy for a while. Feel free to DM me if you want more!
https://www.amazon.com/Understanding-Health-Policy-Clinical-Approach/dp/1259584755/ is an excellent introduction to the healthcare system in the USA.
With regards to "how we got where we are" and "where are we now," as someone else noted, Starr's The Social Transformation of American Medicine is an excellent history of the medical institution, at least until the 80's. Freidson's Profession of Medicine: A Study of the Sociology of Applied Knowledge is also superb. After that, you'll want to look at articles such as "The Shifting Engines of Medicalization" by Conrad (http://hsb.sagepub.com/content/46/1/3.abstract) and The Continued Social Transformation of The Medical Profession (http://hsb.sagepub.com/content/51/1_suppl/S94.abstract) by Timmerman and Ohs for a look at where the field is now.
Forgive me if I'm not optimistic about the data you have provided. The CDC study you cite even admits that the estimated 500,000 to 3,000,000 is in wide dispute and should not be taken as fact. You can't just assume that those numbers are accurate when the source you got them from says they shouldn't be taken as definitive. For instance, the Violence Policy Center estimates an average of 235,700 self-defensive gun uses over a 5 year period, using FBI data. Meanwhile, the Kleck study that the CDC cites in the article you linked has been widely criticized and almost universally rejected as inaccurate. Lastly, surveys that place self-defensive gun use in high numbers often rely on self-reported claims of self-defense. When examined closely, and shown to actual criminal court judges, we find that many of these accounts of 'self-defense' are actually illegal uses of firearms, and have no relation to self-defense. In fact, the 3,000,000 number is technically impossible. According to the Kleck study, the extrapolated number of respondents who reported shooting their assailant was 200,000, which is twice the number of people killed or treated for gunshots in the entire country.
Furthermore, you can't assume that each of those defensive gun uses would have otherwise resulted in injury or death without providing evidence to that effect. In fact, there is good evidence to suggest that many of those defensive gun uses actually result directly in injury or death. Had there not been a gun involved, the victim would likely not have been harmed in any way. According to David Hemenway, using a gun in self-defense is no more likely to reduce the chance of being injured during a crime than various other forms of protective action. In this article, he goes further, pointing out that even after adjusting for confounding factors, individuals who were in possession of a gun were about 4.5 times more likely to be shot in an assault than those not in possession. In this Harvard study of 160,000 people, people defended themselves with a gun in roughly 0.9 percent of crimes committed over this period. Their likelihood of being injured was 10.9%, only 0.01% lower than the likelihood of injury had they not defended themselves at all. They also found that simply running away was safer than defending yourself with a gun.
To conclude, the 3,000,000 estimate is impossible, and the 500,000 is extremely unlikely. Moreover, in many cases what people report as self-defense is actually illegal gun use without any connection to self-defense. In addition, there is no evidence that using a gun in self-defense would have prevented an injury or death from occurring. In fact, the evidence seems to indicate that using a gun in self-defense increases your likelihood of being harmed during an incident. I didn't explore the other problematic factors relating to gun ownership, but it is additionally true that being in possession of a gun makes it more likely to kill oneself, for a family member to kill themselves by accident, for a criminal to kill you with your own gun, for that gun to be stolen and used in a crime, and for you to be shot by police. The overwhelming evidence is that gun ownership correlated with gun deaths, and there are no discernible self-defense benefits to counterbalance that fact.
I initially published by book at $14.99, and then I raised the price to $49.99 to see if actually changed people's perception. This actually skyrocketed my sales. I think people actually took it a bit more seriously. Strange, but can't hurt running small tests.
Here's my link: http://www.amazon.com/Another-Dimension-Clinical-Skills-Education/dp/0985381604/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1425255382&sr=1-2&keywords=joel+palathinkal
This is one of the best introductory books:
Understanding Health Policy: A Clinical Approach by Thomas Bodenheimer & Kevin Grumbach
Note that Bodenheimer coined the "Quadruple Aim." It has great examples.
I'm just going to spam some stuff in here and let you guys sort it out, sorry. It's from another post on another thread, so it's easier to cut and paste. Some of this may already be in there, but I'm sure there's a bunch that isn't:
I'm a big fan of John Paul Stevens' Six Amendments: How and Why We Should Change The Constitution.
I also recommend Carl Bogus: The Hidden History of the Second Amendment.
This op-ed written by David Hemenway back in 2015: There's scientific consensus on guns -- and the NRA won't like it. Much like climate change, the vast majority of researchers studying gun violence agree that gun control works, but news media insists on presenting the progun side as if it has equal scientific weight. It does not. In fact, Hemenway's book Private Guns, Public Health is another you should pick up.
Next is a blogger calling himself the Propaganda Professor. Their blog has many great posts backed up by links to hard science:
https://propagandaprofessor.net/2013/09/30/the-poorly-armed-assault-on-gun-control-how-the-gun-culture-manipulates-statistics-part-1/
https://propagandaprofessor.net/2013/12/09/the-poorly-armed-assault-on-gun-control-how-the-gun-culture-manipulates-statistics-part-2/
https://propagandaprofessor.net/2014/11/23/the-poorly-armed-assault-on-gun-control-how-the-gun-culture-manipulates-statistics-part-3/
https://propagandaprofessor.net/2015/04/25/the-poorly-armed-assault-on-gun-control-how-the-gun-culture-manipulates-statistics-part-4/
https://propagandaprofessor.net/2014/01/20/home-invasion-defensive-gun-use-or-creative-headline/
https://propagandaprofessor.net/2018/01/19/second-amendment-follies-part-1-an-inconvenient-clause/
https://propagandaprofessor.net/2018/02/19/second-amendment-follies-part-2-a-well-regulated-militia/
And my personal favorites:
https://propagandaprofessor.net/2012/02/18/estimating-defensive-gun-uses-reasonably/
https://propagandaprofessor.net/2013/01/06/more-on-defensive-gun-use/
(The guntrolls really hate those, it cuts the legs out from under their #1 argument.)
Investigating the Link Between Gun Possession and Assault - Peer reviewed study showing that people with a gun are 4.5x more likely to be shot than those not
The Myth Behind Defensive Gun Ownership
Gun Threats and Self-Defense Gun Use - from the Harvard School of Public Health
Strong Regulations on Gun Sales Prevent High-Risk Individuals from Accessing Firearms and Can Reduce Violent Crime - 2015 study from Johns Hopkins University showing that gun control works.
Firearm Violence, 1993-2011 - US Dept. of Justice report showing that firearm homicides are down since 1993 (coincidentally the year the Brady Bill was passed); 60% of criminals get their firearms from legal sources like friends, family members, and gun stores; most victims of firearms violence knew their assailant
Victimization During Household Burglary - another DoJ report, this time showing that only 1 in 4 household burglaries result in violent crime, and most of those are performed by a person known to the victim. It also shows that locking doors and windows, putting lights on timers, and other methods are far more effective at deterring and preventing crimes than firearms.
Weapon Involvement in Home Invasion Crimes - Now, I'm not going to lie to you, Kellerman is controversial. I wouldn't go throwing him around as a trump card, pardon the expression. But his research is interesting and provides some insight, even if it isn't exactly the strongest.
Tracing the Guns: The Impact of Illegal Guns on Violence in Chicago - report from Office of the Mayor of Chicago showing that over 60% of guns used in crimes in Chicago come from out of state, proving that Chicago's gun laws would work, if they were not subverted by weak laws in Indiana, Mississippi, Missouri, etc. as well as gun stores located outside city limits in Illinois.
Statistics on the Dangers of Gun Use for Self-Defense
A breakdown of the $229 billion gun violence tab that American taxpayers are paying every year - Yeah, you read that right. $229 BILLION. Think of the tax cuts they could give their cronies if they just outlawed guns...
Right-to-carry gun laws linked to increase in violent crime, Stanford research shows and here
One of my personal favorites, from the National Bureau of Economic Research:
More Gus, More Crime - they hate this one, because they can't find anything against it that isn't "John Lott."
Speaking of, Armed With Reason is another great resource.
Finally, I'm going to leave you with this piece from the "failing" NY Times: How to Reduce Shootings. That ought to keep you out of trouble for some time, and maybe even give you some hard ammo to fight back with.
EDIT: also, why isn't the academic resource page in the sidebar? That should be stickied or something.
Like do you genuinely believe that without guns the rate of violent crime would be literally 4000% higher than it currently is? Is this genuinely a statistic you believe? That without the second amendment the lowest end of your "stopped crimes" would see a higher annual death toll across America than the Vietnam war?
Do you know where those numbers come from? Because I'll tell you where they're from.
Presumably you mean this study by Kleck. Because it's always bloody Kleck.
https://scholarlycommons.law.northwestern.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=6853&context=jclc
Which I've seen whored out every couple weeks. Several points. Firstly its an extrapolation a couple thousand respondents multiplied by 50,000 to represent the nation. Ignoring things like unverified self report, selection bias (people with an agenda are far more likely to agree to performing a survey than someone who has no agenda) then this still means that every single person in that study represents 50,000 people. So if anyone of those respondents do anything it is recorded as if the entire population of Brunswick Georgia did it. Secondly the causality is along the lines of "I carry a gun and I haven't been robbed. Therefore my gun prevented me from being robbed". In which case I have an anti tiger penny that has saved me from literally countless tiger attacks.
Here's Kleck himself being quietly self pwned by a respondent to one of his articles.
https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/02/defensive-gun-ownership-gary-kleck-response-115082
>Update: A response from Evan DeFilippis and Devin Hughes, authors of The Myth Behind Defensive Gun OwnershipWhen Gary Kleck can't defend, he attacks. Instead of offering new insight, Kleck instead baselessly speculates on our motives, suggesting we “hope that total gun prohibition will one day be politically achievable.” To be clear: prohibition is not something we have ever suggested in any of our writing, all of which can found at armedwithreason.com. Not that it should matter, but neither of us are merely “investment counselors” either, as Kleck suggests. In fact, DeFilippis spent most of last year helping design and analyze surveys much larger than Kleck’s.The Florida State professor even goes so far as to describe Dr. David Hemenway, director of Harvard’s Injury Control Research Center and author of more than 130 articles and five books in Economics and Public Health (a total that includes two decisive rebuttals to Kleck and several surveys), as “a man named David Hemenway… who is also untrained in survey methods.”Rather than confront the significant, multidisciplinary research showing that the false-positive problem is ubiquitous when measuring rare events, Kleck pretends the problem is negligible, and links us to a 1998 “rebuttal” where he references surveys that have nothing to do with rare events. As Dr. Hemenway has extensively detailed, suggesting that false negatives could somehow outweigh false positives is indulging in fantasy.Kleck also ignores the fact that his results repeatedly fail tests of external validity. In our original article, we mention that Kleck’s data would require, impossibly, that gun owners use their gun in self-defense in more than 100 percent of burglaries. Kleck’s data also suggests that every year hundreds of thousands of criminals are shot by law-abiding citizens. But where are the hospital records to validate this claim? Kleck insists, with no medical knowledge and without citing a single study, that the vast majority of these criminals never seek hospital treatment, a claim scoffed at by medical professionals.Kleck concludes his article by saying we “have not offered any new criticisms” and, like Dr. Hemenway before us, do “not once cite the one thing that could legitimately cast doubt on our estimates—better empirical evidence.” However, had he read the second page of our column, he would have seen that the entire point of our article was to highlight new empirical evidence debunking Kleck’s claims.Here are the facts Kleck missed: According to his own survey more than 50 percent of respondents claim to have reported their defensive gun use to the police. This means we should find at least half of his 2.5 million annual Defensive Gun Uses (DGUs) in police reports alone. Instead, the most comprehensive nonpartisan effort to catalog police and media reports on DGUs by The Gun Violence Archive was barely able to find 1,600 in 2014. Where are the remaining 99.94 percent of Kleck’s supposed DGUs hiding?It would be disappointing to see any professor relegated to using falsehoods and ad hominem attacks in a desperate attempt to preserve the tattered remains of his thoroughly repudiated research. Yet, such tactics are particularly deplorable when they are used in service of a gun-worshipping culture that generates tragedy on a massive scale.
If there were (at minimum) 500,000 cases of good guy with gun saving the damsel. Then where are they all. We both know the NRA wouldn't shut up about these brave heroes if this was the case. So why is it the same handful brought out year after year.
Not papers, but likely more useful because of that: Check out Norman Daniels's book Just Health, along with several other things he's written: https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/norman-daniels/
Also this book from Madison Powers and Ruth Faden is on topic: http://www.amazon.com/Social-Justice-Foundations-Public-Biomedical/dp/0195375130
I enjoyed Being Mortal, by Atul Gawande. My local library had it.
I completely agree that suicide is the largest cause of gun deaths (not for homicide, however). I also agree with you that improving mental health and income inequality could change the circumstances of these shootings. I disagree that these are the best approaches to preventing gun deaths. Your argument is predicated on the assumption that these deaths would be inevitable. Are they? If an easy, effective means to kill people wasn't so widely available, would this happen? There is substantial evidence that higher gun availability is strongly correlated with more homicide deaths [here]. In particular for suicide, is mental a critical piece? Absolutely [here]. As for your other comment, a piece worth mentioning is that often people buy guns to protect themselves, though it doesn't necessarily keep people safe. Also a rise in socio-economic status requires political will, money and time to take effect. How to prevent gun deaths in the that period?
My last comment is that "more gun control" isn't specific enough. Some policies (waiting periods, regulations in design of guns) have some evidence behind them [here)] and [here]. David Hemenway's Private Guns, Public Health is the most comprehensive summary of the research on this subject. I highly recommend reading it.
Regarding his eyes, get them checked out now. The sooner eye stuff is caught and corrected, the better.
My mom has had every eye thing imaginable. Cateracts removed, then a secondary film reappeared - happens in a small percentage of cateract cases - really helped to get that removed. She also has macular degeneration. She has wet and dry. When her wet was developing, she got shots in the eye to keep it from spreading. They caught it soon enough she could stop the shots after a while.
Don't let his vision fail any further. If his surgery is scheduled, make sure it happens. Vision is priceless.
As for the rest of it, you can make suggestions, but chances are it won't work.
For example: moving to a 55+ apartment where there are others his age and activities. Or, moving to assisted living, again, others his age and activities.
There is most likely a senior center nearby with activities and programs. Getting him involved could help. Some have daily lunches and shuttle services for such.
You might find a book called Being Mortal by Atul Gawande particularly helpful. Your library probably has it.
Long time reader and teacher here -
I agree with skipping any phonics instruction at this stage, and that trying audio books is a good idea. Written language is different than spoken, and listening to written will help with reading it. (Besides that, audio books are great!)
There is a lot of great nonfiction out there that he might enjoy -
these are collections of short articles, which may make them less intimidating:
Gene Weingarten: [The Fiddler in the Subway] (https://www.amazon.com/Fiddler-Subway-World-Class-Violinist-Performances/dp/1439181594/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1505310496&sr=1-1&keywords=gene+weingarten) (I do my best to read everything he writes)
[Sarah Vowell's books] (https://www.amazon.com/Sarah-Vowell/e/B001ILFO7E/ref=sr_tc_2_0?qid=1505310914&sr=1-2-ent)
some of [Joel Achenbach's books] (https://www.amazon.com/Joel-Achenbach/e/B001HMTVXC/ref=sr_tc_2_0?qid=1505310626&sr=1-2-ent), including 'Why Things Are'
not collections, but so good
[The Boys in the Boat] (https://www.amazon.com/Boys-Boat-Americans-Berlin-Olympics/dp/0143125478)
[Seabiscuit] (https://www.amazon.com/Seabiscuit-American-Legend-Ballantine-Readers/dp/0449005615/ref=pd_sim_14_14?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_i=0449005615&pd_rd_r=4P2YTBS454KVBDDS78NP&pd_rd_w=YohLc&pd_rd_wg=g6ySs&psc=1&refRID=4P2YTBS454KVBDDS78NP)
[Tracy Kidder's books] (https://www.amazon.com/Tracy-Kidder/e/B000AQ8T3E)
[Being Mortal] (https://www.amazon.com/Being-Mortal-Medicine-What-Matters/dp/1250076226/ref=la_B00458K698_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1505310411&sr=1-1)
And so many more - I just listened to Erik Larson's [The Devil in the White City] (https://www.amazon.com/Devil-White-City-Madness-Changed/dp/0375725601)...
> as always, i would like to see another book that points to an opposite conclusion; I have yet to see one.
Have you looked? Here is one. In fact the wikipedia article for the book contains a rather long list of opposing studies and books. I feel this is part of the problem with the gun debate in this country, each side simply looks at something that agrees with what they want to be true, ignores everything else that doesn't fit in with what they want, and claims the issue is settled and anyone who disagrees is just uninformed.
In reality the research and stats are a hot mess, and anyone who claims there is some definitive conclusion on the matter I look at with great skepticism.
If you'd like a good lecture on Single Payer I always suggest Tim Faust. He also just put out a good new book that I have been digging into, Health Justice Now: Single Payer and What Comes Next Here;s one of his big lectures
"We can;t do anything become of Mitch McConnell" is an excise I have seen around this sub multiple times in the last week. And if you honestly believe that, please get the fuck out of the way and left the left have it's moment. You lost.
This piece is quite good. Credit where credit is due (though it's framed as a book review of Tim Faust's book Health Justice Now: Single Payer and What Comes Next, which I guess gives WP employees deniability if anyone accuses them of actually liking something about Bernie) .
Obviously the timing is suspicious, coming in the midst of Sanders' criticism of the paper's coverage. The book has been on Amazon for a couple of weeks and I assume was available to reviewers long before that. I guess it's the same as Amazon and Disney spontaneously, by pure coincidence, deciding to pay their workers $15/hr at the exact instant Bernie was beating them up.
Was this actually on the Op-ed page in the print version of the paper?
Understanding Health Policy: A Clinical Approach
Wisdom of Whores is an excellent and informative book on the spread of HIV and AIDS, and the strategy of various organisations to track and control it.
Amazon Link
Well written and easy to read and digest, for what can be an incredibly complex topic.
No for-profit entity will insure people against loss of income because they got too old to work.
The only way there will be "no actual money left" is if we vote to stop paying the tax. I recommend that you not listen to the ridiculous hype about these programs, and instead look at the real numbers.
In the interest of balance, virtually all of the high numbers you're citing come from the work of Gary Kleck, whose methodology has been criticized. You might want to read up on some of that criticism.
http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/wp-content/uploads/sites/1264/2013/09/Response-to-Kleck-SDGU.docx
http://www.amazon.com/Private-Public-Health-David-Hemenway/dp/0472031627
https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/01/defensive-gun-ownership-myth-114262?o=1
The estimates provided by directly surveying people (as Kleck does) about their gun use do not match up as we would predict with hospital records, police reports, or NCVS results. From the third source:
>For example, the claim that millions every year shoot their guns in self-defense has led some to posit that there are more defensive gun uses than criminal uses. This assertion is inexplicable—not backed by any substantive evidence. We have yet to find a single study examining the question that does not show that criminal uses far outweigh defensive uses.
>You might hear gun advocates substantiate this claim by comparing inflated survey numbers like Kleck’s with NCVS crime numbers. But defensive gun use surveys and the NCVS use different methodologies. To compare those two data sets is to break one of the most important laws of statistical analysis: You must always compare likes to likes.
>And indeed, comparing NCVS results to NCVS results yields a very different picture—that more than 9 times as many people are victimized by guns than protected by them.
Thanks for making me look deeper into this and I admit you've seeded some doubt in my mind, but please do the same courtesy, since these conclusions are highly contentious.
So there's a lot of discussion in this thread and I might get downvoted, but it is unfortunately not so simple for the US to just switch to universal healthcare (or universal Medicaid). Our system is dysfunctional, but it's a giant disgusting tumor that essentially lives on the largest and most vital parts of our economy, and you can't just cut it out. Love it or hate it our healthcare system, the way it is, employs millions of people in administration and health insurance who do jobs specific to this system. Obamacare was sabotaged by Republicans, but even Obamacare was just a band-aid and not a true fix.
If you want to get an excellent and academic overview of the issues facing US healthcare policy, check out this book: https://www.amazon.com/Understanding-Health-Policy-Clinical-Approach/dp/1259584755/
lmao You have no answer bc there is no sound reason as to why this is ok. I'l do the same as you and not acknowledge the age comments. I've studied the sex trade industry. Read this book and do some research into the AIDS epidemic that your luxurious and "sophisticated" trade fuels around the world. Instead of ignoring everyone that opposes your views, pick up a fucking book and read about the daily mutilations and rapes that occur in 3rd world countries around the world. You have your parameters wrong. You think that times have changed. Being the 21st century, nothing has changed. The sex industry is just as much a stigmata and burden as its ever been. Thank god OP is in another country because Im sick of my tax dollars footing the healthcare bill for the prostituting whores of America. And before you question that I dare someone to show me that a street walker can get (real) health insurance without a sophisticated lie and forged pay stubs.