What’s Behind China’s Dramatic Rise in Heart Procedures
<p>China’s increasing use of health care services may be as much due to the country’s recent expansion of health coverage as it is a byproduct of a rapidly modernizing economy. In an invited commentary in <em>JAMA Internal Medicine</em>, David Blumenthal, M.D., William Hsiao, and Daniel M. Blumenthal, M.D., seek to explain why procedures for coronary artery disease performed in China’s urban hospitals increased more than 15-fold from 2001 to 2011. </p><p>For the millions of Chinese who once lacked access to even basic health care services, the expansion in insurance coverage likely uncovered a substantial unmet need for care, the authors say. Higher consumption of meat and dairy products, severe levels of air pollution, and the country’s highly profit-driven health care system have all likely contributed as well.</p>
http://www.commonwealthfund.org/publications/newsletters/ealerts/2016/mar/whats-behind-chinas-dramatic-rise-in-heart-procedures Read the summary