The current role of economics in the study of health and medical care is extremely significant. It is often claimed that the issue of healthcare is fundamentally an aspect of medical parameter and the considerations are beyond any jurisdiction of economics. Nevertheless, economics becomes relevant when the issue of universal healthcare coverage is taken into consideration in the midst of increasing expenses on medical needs. Economic tools are extremely helpful in this context; they are applied to determine the financial situation of the healthcare sphere and amplify the policymaking process with data and information regarding healthcare issues.
According to Trisolini (2008), the main approach of economics is to bridge the gap between unlimited needs and the recourses to fulfill the aforesaid gap. However, in this case, high-end medical necessities, offered by the private medical facilities, have superseded the medical facilities available for the general public in the government outlets. Thus, theoretical economics and economic formulations have offered numerous solutions to construct the two tire system in healthcare, which has reduced the differences between the two facilities. Canada is one country that has successfully applied economics to facilitate public healthcare and make it competitive to private facilities available.
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However, Baggott (2008) notes that the best possible solution in the healthcare system, which can be offered by economics, is providing healthcare coverage for the general population without the ability to pay at private facilities in countries where government intervention is weak in terms of public health and medical care. Economics should analyze the market available under a given situation and construct models of health insurance that would be suitable for a large range of demography. Governmental policymakers would then make it mandatory for employers to provide the required healthcare insurance to their respective employees in accordance to their needs.
The healthcare industry takes account of the health services offering by a healthcare provider. Dawson (2009) states that, more often than not, these services are sponsored by the patients themselves, or by their insurance companies. However, these services can also be financed by the public administrative institutions through national healthcare schemes (such as the National Health Service in the United Kingdom), or they may be provided for by NGO’s, charities or self-volunteers, predominantly in the poorer and third-world nations.
People inhabiting rural or remote regions experience a less encouraging healthcare services outcome in comparison to the status quo in metropolitan locales. According to Marshall (2008), rural inhabitants have a greater occurrence of health risk aspects, higher frequency of admission to healthcare establishments, frequent occurrences of “avoidable” deaths, and various other unfavorable health consequences. A lot of issues play their part in the existence of such degrees of differences including geographic remoteness, socioeconomic shortcomings, and a distinctive lack of healthcare services providing facilities, greater susceptibility to injury hazards, and the various necessities of the rural population. In many parts of the world it is not unusual for rural communities to be located approximately 1000 km away from places able to provide the basic services like victuals, banking, and medical facilities. In addition, the ideals, customs, and convictions of the rural population generally differ to a large extent from that of the urban dwellers. Various researches have confirmed that the rural population is a lot less likely or capable of seeking medical attention as compared to people residing in major metropolitan areas.
A financially secure healthcare facility is vitally essential for the sustenance of a community’s health, in addition to its economy, particularly in rural locations. Local healthcare providers not only offer inhabitants vital healthcare facilities, but, in addition, also provide a significant employment opportunity and contribute to the local state of economy. However, Smith (2008) notes that under-facilitated rural healthcare facilities find it hard to sustain financial steadiness and react to the increasing demands for healthcare technologies and standardized quality health outcomes. Traditionally, such small-scaled healthcare organizations have been exposed to difficulties, which were both intrinsic (associated with the operative issues in the hospital and its immediate surroundings) and extrinsic (concerning wide-scaled repayment structures, policymaking and legislative issues) in nature. All these can be achieved using the appropriate economic tools. Thus, it is obvious that even if the perimeters of economics are very different, it can still influence the aspects of healthcare and medicine by a large extent.