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The Diagnosis and Treatment of Medicare
By Andrew J. Rettenmaier and Thomas R. Saving, 179 pp, $25.95.
Washington, DC, American Enterprise Institute, 2007.
ISBN-13 978-0-8447-4251-9.
JAMA. 2007;298:1569.
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This book is of interest to health care policy makers as well as physicians who seek to better understand the crisis in Medicare funding and its potential solutions. The book will be useful background to anyone who wants to explain the crisis in understandable terms to consumers, patients, or one's own family. Andrew Rettenmaier and Thomas Saving, of the Washington think tank the American Enterprise Institute, are economists who have precisely spelled out for laymen why Medicare funding, as we know it, is unsustainable. Saving also speaks with the authority of serving as a public trustee of the Social Security system.
Over the course of 14 chapters, the authors carefully spell out the historical roots of Medicare, the current crisis, and why it will be virtually impossible for Medicare to continue to provide first-dollar coverage for retiree health expenses over the next 20 years. They strengthen our understanding that current . . . [Full Text of this Article]
Prentiss Taylor, MD, Reviewer
Rush University
Chicago, Illinois
prentiss.taylor@comcast.net
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