FORUM: FORUM Books

"Health Policy - Understanding Our Choices from National Reform to Market Force"
Edited by Marilynn M. Rosenthal and Max Heirich.

Health Policy provides a rare glimpse into the frank exchanges that occur between proponents of quite different solutions to the dilemma of health care reform. the discussions captured here, which took place during a critical period in U.S. health policy formation, from 1994 to 1996, shed new light on the nature of health care reform, the nature of the political process, and the realistic choices that now lie before us. Marilynn M. Rosenthal, Ph.D., is Professor of Sociology, University of Michigan-Dearborn and Coordinator of the FORUM on Health Policy at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. Max Heirich, Ph.D., is Professor of Sociology and Director of the Worker Health Program, at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor.

George Anders, author of Health Against Wealth: HMO's and the Breakdown of Medical Trust describes Health Policy - Understanding Our Choices from National Reform to Market Force as,

"A valuable book for scholars, medical practitioners, and anyone wondering why our health care system is so easy to criticize but so hard to reform. Marilynn Rosenthal and Max Heirich had done an extraordinary job of pulling together the competing visions of more than forty leading thinkers and doers in the field. The result is a crisply analytical overview of the issues that matter most - ranging from the legacy of the Clinton plan to the future of managed care."

This book can be ordered from: Westview Press, 5500 Central Avenue, Boulder, Colorado, 80301-2877
TEL: (303) 444-3541
FAX: (303) 449-3356
Or visit Westview Press on the internet

Look for these new titles based on other FORUM conferences. Marilynn M. Rosenthal is the series editor and appropriate faculty members are individual book editors.

" Medical Mistakes: What Do We Know?"
Marilynn M. Rosenthal and Kathleen Sutcliffe, Editors
Is unique in its scope and balance. It includes a summary of what we have learned since the Harvard Medical Practice study by one of the study's principle investigators. It encompasses a variety of perspectives including a surgeon, a chief nurse, a family practitioner, journalist and MCO manager. It contains expert reviews of what risk management, evidence-base medicine and the QA movement contribute to error reduction in medicine. Perhaps its most unusual contribution is an informed, balanced and objective discussion of what systems theories can and cannot contribute to patient safty efforts. And it concludes with a tough-minded discussion, by the editors, of what we know, what we can understand better, what we do, what we don't do and what we can do better to understand, detect, reduce and prevent harmful anticipated and unanticipated consequences of medical practice. (publication Summer/Fall, 2001)

"Managed Care: The Challenge of Regulation"
John Billi and Gail Agrawal, Editors John Billi, M.D., is the Associate Dean for Clinical Affairs and Associate Professor of Internal Medicine at the University of Michigan Medical School. Gail Agrawal J.D., M.P.H., Professor of Law, University of North Carolina School of Law.

This timely book includes an historical overview of the evolution of managed care; the pattern of decision-making in seminal court cases as well as contrasting and conflicting views on the role and effectiveness of government regulation of managed care.

" Where is the Pharmaceutical Industry Taking Us?"
Duane Kirking, Editor Duane Kirking, Ph.D., Pharm.D., is Professor of Pharmacy Administration at the University of Michigan School of Pharmacy.

This book is a powerful and insightful analysis of the role of the pharmaceutical industry in America today with perspectives from the industry, government, patient, payers and social scientists.

" Medical Specialization and the American Health Care System"
Stephan Mick and Eugenia Carpenter, Editors Stephen Mick, Ph.D. is Chair of Health Administration at University of Roanoke, North Virginia and Eugenia Carpenter, Ph.D. is a health care consultant.

A stimulating discussion of how the proliferation of medical specialization has driven the shape of American health care with its myriad and conflicting patterns. An up-to-date analysis physician supply trends and issues.