The Four Main Aspects Of Canada's Healthcare System

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There are different types of healthcare systems around the world. Each one is operated differently even though they may have similarities. Canada is a country that has a different approach to healthcare than the U.S. does. The comparison of the four main aspects of a healthcare will show which is a more preferable healthcare system. These aspects are: cost, access, quality, and safety. Healthcare costs in Canada are deemed as “free” but in fact they are not due to the high taxation that Canadians pay. In 2013, a typical Canadian family of four can expect to pay $11,320 for public health insurance (Esmail, 2013). Before inflation occurred, over the last decade healthcare insurance went up by 53.3 percent (Esmail, 2013). Canada’s healthcare …show more content…
The healthcare card is used whenever a patient goes into a physician’s office or emergency department for treatment.
For other additional services not included in the standard plan of care, such as paying for prescription drugs or dental visits, Canadians can opt to pay for this with supplemental insurance. Most citizens do use private insurance to help pay for those services not covered under the Medicare (www.washingtonpost.com, 2015).
Some of the problems to access of healthcare in Canada involve a shortage of providers. Because everyone has the right to receive care in this country, there is a high demand for physicians. There is only about one doctor right now for every 1000 Canadians (www.canadian-healthcare.org, 2015). On average it takes about 3-4 weeks for a Canadian to see their PCP, which is more than half the time in the United States. Canada has recently taken great steps in order to significantly reduce the wait times for citizens to see their primary care physicians. In 2005 Canada had each province set benchmarks for wait times for a variety of procedures, and many of the provinces now meet wait time benchmarks for at least 75 percent of patients. The Canadian healthcare system has taken great lengths in order to ensure that every eligible citizen is covered, and even though
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“Patient safety, as defined by the World Health Organization, is the prevention of errors and adverse effects to patients that are associated with health care.” (Patient Safety Systems Chapter, 2015) As humans, we make mistakes. As patients, we expect zero mistakes to be made in our care, due to the potential harmful or fatal effects those mistakes can have. However, The Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI) unfortunately estimates that 15 million incidents of medical harm occur in U.S. hospitals each year. (Patient Safety Partnership, 2010) A necessary focus, patient safety chides on the fact that we are not to harm people with our care, or add to the burden of their illness. (Patient Safety Systems Chapter,