Louise Slaughter: “In my judgment, one of the most important aspects of the patient's bill of rights gets the least attention, and it is…”

“In my judgment, one of the most important aspects of the patient's bill of rights gets the least attention, and it is the potential impact on public health. Now, although most people think of this initiative as one involving individual patients and their access to care, there are major public health implications as well. In our Nation, public health has become something of a forgotten stepchild of the health care system. In other industrialized nations, public health goes hand-in-hand with individual health care: Communicable diseases are reported in a standardized fashion, all children receive vaccinations during their regular checkups, and public health professionals can track the incidence of disorders like cancer based on geography. None of that is true in the United States. In this country, we have created an artificial division between individual health care and public health. Children are supposed to receive immunizations on a certain schedule, but many fail to receive some or all of their shots because they move, switch insurance plans, or lose coverage. Different States track and report different disorders in different ways, and the health of the individual is examined in total isolation from the health of the community. The patient's bill of rights has the potential to address some of these problems.”