Study On The Development Of The U.S.Healthcare Industry

As a representative of developed countries,the United States leads the world in many fields.After a long-term exploration process,the U.S.healthcare industry has developed into an emerging industrial cluster centered on medical care,with a high degree of integration on social management from social security programs(such as Medicare and Medicaid),financing and risk sharing from private health insurance,relying on technical support from research organizations and labor supply of educational institutions.In turn,this industrial cluster has moved progressively from a single diagnosis and treatment to a whole-process health management.Since the adoption of reform and opening-up policy,China's medical care field has made remarkable achievements.However,due to changes in conditions such as urbanization,industrialization,and population aging,the health maintenance and promotion field faces a series of new challenges.The contradiction between a short supply and an increasing demand of health care is still outstanding.The coordination between health development and economic and social development also needs to be strengthened.To this end,starting from the “Several Opinions on Promoting the Development of Healthcare Industry” promulgated by the State Council in 2013,all levels of governments and relevant departments are making efforts to promote the development of healthcare industry.The U.S.healthcare industry is very representative and advanced.Studying thoroughly on this area is of great theoretical and practical significance for stimulating the development of China's healthcare industry.This paper focuses on the development of the U.S.healthcare industry from the economic perspective.After recognizing the definition and classification of healthcare industry and the particularity of healthcare market,basing on the theories of medical care market and health insurance market,and setting in the development history of the U.S.healthcare industry and its influencing factors,the paper analyzes the systems evolution,development patterns and development mechanisms in the course of U.S.healthcare industry development.In the meantime,combined with the achievements,challenges and trends of the development of U.S.healthcare industry,the paper brings the instructions and enlightenment to the development of China's healthcare industry according to its status quo and problems.The development of the U.S.healthcare industry has a profound foundation and background.Since the mid-1930 s,the development history of U.S.healthcare industry has generally included the start-up stage(mid-1930 s to mid-1960s),the rapid growth stage(mid-1960 s to early 1990s),the transition stage(early 1990 s to early 21 st century)and the mature stage(early 21 st century to present).Because each influencing factor plays a different role,each stage presents different contents and characteristics.From the results of theoretical and empirical analysis,factors such as industrial inflation,income level,insurance coverage and aging population have had a great impact on the development of healthcare industry.With the changes in the development stages,relevant systems,development patterns and development mechanisms are constantly evolving and changing.From systems point of view,U.S.healthcare industry has experienced the process of improving insurance coverage to achieve equity,curbing health expenditures to lift efficiency,and taking into account both equity and efficiency.From the perspective of development patterns,U.S.healthcare industry has experienced a shift from Managed Care System to Integrated Delivery System and continued to extend to the field of social security programs while deepening its commercialization.In terms of development mechanisms,the stakeholders' composition and its hierarchical relationship has formed three development mechanisms of U.S.healthcare industry,Cost Control Mechanism,Access Improvement Mechanism and Quality Assurance Mechanism,guided by the theory of Second Best.The three mechanisms are correlated and interacted to promote jointly the development of healthcare industry.The U.S.healthcare industry has achieved remarkable achievements after years of development.From the perspectives of direct economic effects,its development can drive the improvement of total output of various industrial sectors as an important part of the tertiary industry.Meanwhile,it can also release employment potential,spur on wages growth and expand consumer demand.In the terms of indirect economic effects,healthcare industry not only has achieved the improvement of overall economy,but also led to the growth of other industrial sectors,so that economic effects have spread to a greater extent.From the view of intra-industry effects,the development of healthcare industry has greatly improved the health of the people,the utilization of services and coverage of insurance.Even so,the U.S.healthcare industry still faces the shortage and maldistribution of health care providers,the loopholes of development patterns,and the low efficiency of development mechanisms.Due to these challenges,the development trend of U.S.healthcare industry will focus on the advancement of medical reform,the enhancement of cost control,the diversification of practitioners,the reinforcement of value orientation and the integration of technology.Compared with U.S.healthcare industry,China enters into healthcare industry a little later and still needs the development in the long term.China's healthcare industry is at the rapid growth stage.Each sub-sector has a different starting point of development.It also faces the challenges such as the lack of human resources,the immaturity of development patterns and the imperfection of development mechanisms.Based on the challenges and indepth analysis on U.S.healthcare industry above,China's healthcare industry can attain development by optimizing human resources allocation,innovating industrial development patterns,balancing industrial development mechanisms,strengthening consumer self-management,and utilizing biological and information technology.In addition,according to the actual situations,China will build a development road of healthcare industry with Chinese characteristics.