Routledge Inescapable Decisions: The Imperatives of Health Reform

Inescapable Decisions examines the disarray in the American health care system and proposes major corrective strategies. Mechanic shows that the high-technology interventionist type of medicine commonly practiced in the United States has lost its sense of priorities and balance. Expensive and sometimes dangerous procedures of unknown efficacy are used excessively and often inappropriately, while many basic preventive and primary care services remain unavailable to those who need them the most. This incredibly complex system of care operates in an environment of heavy-landed rules and regulations and enormous waste of resources. Review -Inescapable Decisions is David Mechanic's finest book. If one had to select a single volume to give to a health professional, a policy-maker, or a lay person that represented by social science is essential to health and health care, this collection of essays is that book. . . . No one has put together a more impressive collection of essays about the dangerous complexities in America's health and health care.- --Arthur Kleinman, M.D., Harvard Medical School -Splendid. . . . Inescapable Decisions is by far the best book on this critical topic yet to appear.- --Matilda White Riley, National Institute on Aging, NIH -This is a well-written, well-documented, and provocative volume. It is a more coherent collection than most volumes consisting of previously published work by a single investigator. . . . This is first-rate work by one of the best people in the field.- --Charles A. Kiesler, Contemporary Sociology "Inescapable Decisions is David Mechanic's finest book. If one had to select a single volume to give to a health professional, a policy-maker, or a lay person that represented by social science is essential to health and health care, this collection of essays is that book. . . . No one has put together a more impressive collection of essays about the dangerous complexities in America's health and health care." --Arthur Kleinman, M.D., Harvard Medical School "Splendid. . . . Inescapable Decisions is by far the best book on this critical topic yet to appear." --Matilda White Riley, National Institute on Aging, NIH "This is a well-written, well-documented, and provocative volume. It is a more coherent collection than most volumes consisting of previously published work by a single investigator. . . . This is first-rate work by one of the best people in the field." --Charles A. Kiesler, Contemporary Sociology "Inescapable Decisions is David Mechanic's finest book. If one had to select a single volume to give to a health professional, a policy-maker, or a lay person that represented by social science is essential to health and health care, this collection of essays is that book. . . . No one has put together a more impressive collection of essays about the dangerous complexities in America's health and health care." --Arthur Kleinman, M.D., Harvard Medical School "Splendid. . . . Inescapable Decisions is by far the best book on this critical topic yet to appear." --Matilda White Riley, National Institute on Aging, NIH "This is a well-written, well-documented, and provocative volume. It is a more coherent collection than most volumes consisting of previously published work by a single investigator. . . . This is first-rate work by one of the best people in the field." --Charles A. Kiesler, Contemporary Sociology About the Author David Mechanic is director of the Institute of Health, Health Care Policy, and Aging Research at Rutgers University, and University Professor and the Rene Dubos Professor of Behavioral Sciences.