US Health Policy: Critical Evaluation in Context of Women/Minorities

This report provides a critical evaluation of US health policy, specifically focusing on its impact on the health and well-being of women and minority groups. It begins with an overview of the historical, political, ethical, and economic perspectives influencing the policy, including the Affordable Care Act, Medicare, and Medicaid. The report then identifies the key drivers, champions, and gaps in the policy, highlighting the needs of these vulnerable populations. It analyzes current research on the topic, examining trends in health outcomes, such as the reduction in certain cancers among women and the rise of chronic diseases. The report also explores conceptual frameworks like the Health Equity Policy and its relation to health care delivery. Finally, the report evaluates the effectiveness of the policy, considering factors such as insurance coverage and access to health services, ultimately aiming to understand and improve healthcare outcomes for women and minority groups in the United States. This analysis is valuable for understanding the complexities of healthcare policy and its impact on diverse populations.

Running head: US HEALTH POLICY
US Health Policy
-Critical Evaluation in context of the health and wellbeing of women and minority
groups
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

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Table of Contents
Introduction................................................................................................................................3
-Background...........................................................................................................................3
-Health policy or advocacy/social issue.................................................................................3
-Aim.......................................................................................................................................3
Discussion..................................................................................................................................3
-Historical, political, ethical and economic perspectives of the selected policy....................4
-the champions of the policy, their needs, the gaps and the driving factors..........................5
-Identification and discussion of current research related to health policy in relation to the
current policy issue................................................................................................................6
-Emergent and ongoing researches........................................................................................7
-Conceptual frameworks or theoretical underpinning of the policy (with diagram).............8
..............................................................................................................................................10
..............................................................................................................................................10
..............................................................................................................................................10
..............................................................................................................................................10
..............................................................................................................................................10
-Evaluation of the effectiveness of the mandate or standard in the implementation of the
policy....................................................................................................................................11
Conclusion................................................................................................................................11
References:...............................................................................................................................12

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Introduction
-Background
Health policies can be understood as a set of frameworks that are implemented by
governments and health policy administrators to set a standard code of practice through
which the primary objectives of the health care delivery system can b be achieved. Health
care polices therefore assists the decision making process of health care providers and help to
maintain best services in health care delivery. Analysis of health cre polices is an important
approach that helps to understand and analyze the efficiency of a health care policy I terms of
its ability to achieve health care objectives (Barr, 2016; Betancourt et al., 2016).
-Health policy or advocacy/social issue
The health policy studied in this study is the US health policy under the context of the health
and wellbeing of women and minority groups in the country. The US health policies that has
been aimed towards the improvement of the health and well being of its people, improve
accessibility to care, increase health care coverage and affordability and support utilization of
health care services within the population (Makary & Daniel, 2016; Williams & Collins,
2016).
-Aim
The aim of the study is to analyze the health care policy in context to the historical, political,
ethical and economic perspectives of the policy and find relations to researches related to
health care policy and identify conceptual and theoretical framework /underpinnings that can
be associated with the policy. This would help to understand the effectiveness of the policy in
terms of its implementations and outcomes.
Discussion

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-Historical, political, ethical and economic perspectives of the selected policy
The historical roots of the health policy for women and minorities including the vulnerable
groups starts from the idea of the affordable care along with the development of Medicare
and medicate programs. The healthcare policies in USA has provided a uniform system fo
healthcare coverage through a multi-player universal health coverage fund thereby creating a
hybrid system of health care insurance and coverage. It was estimated that in 2014, 48% of
the spending for US healthcare was funded privately which included 28% from households
and 20% from private business. Contribution of the federal government was assessed to be at
28% and that of local government at 17%, moreover, most of the health care was financed
privately (Dieleman et al., 2016).
It was estimated that as of 2014, 89.6% of the US population ( 283.2 million people) has
healthcare insurance coverage and 66% of them were insured privately and 36.5% (115.4
million) receiving coverage from the government. Medicare provides coverage to 50.5
million people, Medicade to 61.65 million people and Veteren’s administration/ military care
to 14.14 million people. The healthcare coverage for women and vulnerable groups by the
Government has been accounted to b at 77.5%. However, it was also estimated that almost
32.9 million people lack any health care insurance in US as of 2014 (Blank et al., 2017;
Gaynor et al., 2017).
It was estimated that as of 2013 United States spent 16.4% of the GDP or $8713 per person
making it the highest among any OECD country with an average of 8.9% per individual. This
shows that a significant economic focus is paid by the United States government on the
health care expenditure in order to maintain health care accessibility as well as the health and
well being of its people including the women and the vulnerable groups. The fact that US
spends more than double of the average spending on health care by other OECD countries

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shows not only the economic strength of the country but a positive outlook towards public
health and well being (Frumkin, 2016; Williams & Collins, 2016).
-the champions of the policy, their needs, the gaps and the driving factors
The healthcare policies of US have been influenced factors that drove the key decisions
related to health care delivery process. These driving factors includes the cost that was a
primary barrier for people to access health care services throughout the country considering
the high expense associated with several treatments. The increasing age of the population is
another factor that that implied an increase in the ability of the healthcare providers to
increase its access to people. The adaptation of technologies and development of new
technologies were another factor that influenced the healthcare delivery process, its efficiency
as well as its reach to people. Mobile clinics or drug store clinics especially for women and
vulnerable groups have provided high accessibility to primary care services and provide
referrals to specialized polices (Boulware et al., 2016).
The key champions who drove the concerns regarding the health and wellbeing and equitable
access to health care services for women and minority groups includes the healthcare leaders
and health care professionals who consistently tried to understand the need for a better access
to improve health and wellbeing and the political leaders who fought for the cause of equal
rights and privileges for them through their consistent political campaigns and discourse with
the public and policy makers (Oliveira et al., 2019).
The need for health care policy for these groups were outlined by the necessity of equitable
healthcare that was nondiscriminatory or biased against genders, sexuality, racial profile,
ethnic or cultural identity. This also included the need of a respectful health care delivery
system that understands and respects culturally and gender differences and shows adequate
sensitivity. The gaps in the health care delivery system and the health care policy in the

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achievement of equal health and wellbeing and equitable access to health care among the
women and the vulnerable groups in US can be understood by the disproportionate insurance
of the population especially from women and minority groups was shown to have lesser
coverage of insurance by 64.5% while insurance coverage for male adults from various
minority groups such as the Hispanic and Asian families went down by 32.64% and 57.28%
respectively (McDowell et al., 2019).
-Identification and discussion of current research related to health policy in relation to
the current policy issue
Studies by Rubinsak et al. (2019) shows that the health and wellbeing of women in the
United states have increased over the last 50 years with 74.31% reduction in the incidences of
cervical cancers, 66.34% reduction in breast cancers, 43.23% reduction in arthritis, 31.23%
reduction in cardio vascular diseases, 76.34% increase of healthy deliveries and access to
maternity care and increase in life expectancy by 2.7 years and improvement in elderly care
for women. However, studies have also shown that a proportional increase in other health
problems such as teenage pregnancy, obesity, Type II diabetes, ovarian cancer and sexually
transmitted disease has increased in over the ten years and incidents of inter personal violence
and domestic violence against women have also increased over the last five years. These
study show that even though there has been a significant reduction in the number of health
conditions that women faced earlier, thereby indicating a positive health and wellbeing
among women incidents of newer health conditions shows that the healthcare systems need to
increase their effort to address those health problems faced by women (Kazmerski et al.,
2015).
Various studies on health policies for minority groups show that the rates of violence and
violent crimes against minority groups such as Hispanics, African Americans, Asians and

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Middle Easterns have increased in the last five years along with an increase in the rates of
health incidences such as cardio vascular diseases, diabetes and cancer among them. It has
also been pointed out by Betancourt et al. (2016) that there has been a significant decline in
the health and wellbeing of the minority groups in US over the last five years due to the
reduced access to health care services and limited health care coverage among the minority
groups in terms of healthcare expenditure due to which their access to health services and
thereby the wellbeing gets significantly limited (Williams & Collins, 2016).
-Emergent and ongoing researches
Current studies on women health shows a trend of an increase in chronic health care
problems such as obesity, osteon arthritis, Type II diabetics, Renal diseases and depression.
This has been attributed to increase in incidence of violence against women at workplaces as
well as domestically, negligence towards self-care and lack of awareness amongst the
women. Studies by World Health Organization have shown similar trends in the increase in
the incident of diabetes, cardio vascular diseases and obesity in other developed countries
such as Australia, UK and Germany. Furthermore the studies indicate that the health and well
being of the female shave been greatly influenced by a change in the lifestyles and also due to
the limited accessibility to the health care services as a result of which incidents of health
problems have become more common among them. This indicate a health gap within the
American population (Gaynor et al., 2017).
Within the minority groups currents studies shows that the incidents of obesity and cardio
vascular diseases have increase among Hispanics by 68.5% and African Americas by 82.3%
thereby showing a significantly higher risk of healthcare condition among them. Among them
the females within the Hispanic communities were found to have 23.5% more risks of these
diseases compared to the counter parts in African American communities with the risk of

8US HEALTH POLICY
11.23%. it has been suggested by Boulware et al. (2016) through the studies on the health
care accessibility to females minority groups such as the Hispanics and the African
Americans has shown that in the last five years there has been an improvement in the overall
health and wellbeing, which can be seen through an increase in the average life expectancy
and improvement in child care services causing lesser number of miscarriages and
complications related to pregnancy. Furthermore, it has also been pointed out that the
Affordable Care Act (ACA) has allowed better coverage for the females and the minority
groups through insurance coverage’s such as Medicare and Medigade in order to support
better health care accessibility (Rubinsak et al., 2019).
-Conceptual frameworks or theoretical underpinning of the policy (with diagram)
The public health policy for the health and wellbeing for the people of USA can be evaluated
through its relation with the Health Equity Policy which focuses on three important aspects
namely, a change in policy, a change in institutional level and building the capacity of the
community. The change in the policies in health care was an important factor that have
helped the health care providers, organizations and delivery systems to focus their effort to
reduce incidents of diseases such as cervical cancers and breast cancers among women
including the women from the minority groups. He policy changes also helped to increase
focus on institutional change that supported better accessibility to health care services for
women and minorities in the last 15 years. Furthermore, the policies also focus on supporting
the communities to improve their health wellbeing through community outreaches and
community empowerment programs to develop a stronger interaction and ensure
empowerment of the community members. Its advocacy groups furthermore ensure better
interaction and accessibility to health care programs, services and support data as well as
research from them (McDowell et al., 2019).

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Figure: Heath policy. Source: McDowell et al., 2019

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The framework that can be further utilized in order to address the health inequalities between
the female and minority groups in USA can be used Equity Framework for Health that
promotes the engagement and empowerment of the women and minority groups in USA by
focusing on quantification of the level of inequalities and understanding the barriers to
equitable access in order to integrate the equity goals approach and indicators into the various
policies, plans and development agendas thereby helping to target resources and yield private
partnership for equity (Kazmerski et al., 2015).
Fig: The Equity framework for Health source: Kazmerski et al., 2015
The health care policies can be associated with the Post-modernist theory of health care that
focuses on the binary systems an ideas that influences a postmodern society and providing
support to the growth and development of societies to better health care. IT can also be
Quantifying the
level of
inequalities
Integrating equity
goals, approaches,
indicators into
policies, plans and
development
agendas
Understanding the
barriers to
equitable access
Yield public-
private
partnerships for
equity
Target resources
and effort to reach
the women and
minority groups .
Analysis Action
Advocacy
and dialogue

11US HEALTH POLICY
related to the theory of Health Care Equity that promotes better access to health care to
people who are at most need of it and thereby driving health care promotion and coverage
(McDowell et al., 2019).
-Evaluation of the effectiveness of the mandate or standard in the implementation of the
policy
From the studies on the effectiveness of the health care policies it was found out that Federal
initiatives developed by the US department of Health and Women Services and the Office of
Minority Health (OMH) have been able to provide the natives of Alaska and the Indian
settlements across US better healthcare coverage through which an improvement in their
overall health and wellbeing has been achieved. It was also estimated that the affordable
health care act helped to increase health care accessibility to 27.6 million people which
started to decline after the tax revisions made by President Donald Trump in the year 2017 as
a result of which a reduction in healthcare insurance coverage has been noticed among the
minority groups. Studies have shown that accessibility to care among the minority groups and
the women within these groups in terms of primary health care access, dental care,
preventable hospitalization and elderly care have increased significantly over the last few
years however the coverage in terms of government expenditure has reduced over the last two
years (Makary & Makary, 2016).
Conclusion
From the analysis of the above study it can be concluded that the US healthcare policy has
been effective in an overall sense in th improvement of the health and wellbeing of the
women and the minority groups within the community however, it should be considered how
the increase on certain health conditions show new risks and new inequalities in the health
and wellbeing for women and the minority groups.

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References:
Barr, D. A. (2016). Introduction to US Health Policy: the organization, financing, and
delivery of health care in America. JHU Press.
Betancourt, J. R., Green, A. R., Carrillo, J. E., & Owusu Ananeh-Firempong, I. I. (2016).
Defining cultural competence: a practical framework for addressing racial/ethnic
disparities in health and health care. Public health reports.
Blank, R., Burau, V., & Kuhlmann, E. (2017). Comparative health policy. Macmillan
International Higher Education.
Boulware, L. E., Cooper, L. A., Ratner, L. E., LaVeist, T. A., & Powe, N. R. (2016). Race
and trust in the health care system. Public health reports.
Dieleman, J. L., Baral, R., Birger, M., Bui, A. L., Bulchis, A., Chapin, A., ... & Lavado, R.
(2016). US spending on personal health care and public health, 1996-
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Frumkin, H. (2016). Urban sprawl and public health. Public health reports.
Gaynor, M., Mostashari, F., & Ginsburg, P. B. (2017). Making health care markets work:
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Kazmerski, T., McCauley, H. L., Jones, K., Borrero, S., Silverman, J. G., Decker, M. R., ... &
Miller, E. (2015). Use of reproductive and sexual health services among female
family planning clinic clients exposed to partner violence and reproductive
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Makary, M. A., & Daniel, M. (2016). Medical error—the third leading cause of death in the
US. Bmj, 353, i2139.

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McDowell, M. J., Hughto, J. M., & Reisner, S. L. (2019). Correction to: Risk and protective
factors for mental health morbidity in a community sample of female-to-male trans-
masculine adults. BMC psychiatry, 19(1), 45.
Oliveira, D. F., Ma, Y., Woodruff, T. K., & Uzzi, B. (2019). Comparison of National
Institutes of Health Grant Amounts to First-Time Male and Female Principal
Investigators. Jama, 321(9), 898-900.
Rubinsak, L. A., Christianson, M. S., Akers, A., Carter, J., Kaunitz, A. M., & Temkin, S. M.
(2019). Reproductive health care across the lifecourse of the female cancer
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Williams, D. R., & Collins, C. (2016). Racial residential segregation: a fundamental cause of
racial disparities in health. Public health reports.