Health affairs
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Improving the quality of care is a national priority in the United States; however, it is not clear how to accelerate progress for mental health care. We recommend advances in three capacities: (1) developing quality improvement resources applicable to a diverse set of mental health disorders, clients, and service settings; (2) improving the infrastructure for providing evidence-based psychotherapy and psychosocial interventions; and (3) promoting innovation in financial incentives for quality improvement in mental health care. We also discuss the need to develop leadership among health care stakeholders and community engagement to promote public commitment to high-quality care in mental health.
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International medical graduates (IMGs) represent a large proportion of the population entering graduate medical education (GME) programs. Many of these internationally trained physicians go on to practice medicine in the United States. ⋯ More detailed longitudinal analyses are required to better understand the interwoven issues of physician supply, consumers' needs, and the role of IMGs in the U. S. health care system.
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Almost 60,000 Indian physicians practice in the United States, United Kingdom, Canada, and Australia--a workforce equal to 10 percent of the physicians in India and the largest émigré physician workforce in the world. I traveled to India to interview leaders in medical education, health policy, and public health, to better characterize and understand Indian physician emigration. A changing political and policy environment in India is raising new questions about what might be done to keep more of India's physicians at home.
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Paramedics provide life-saving emergency medical care to patients in the out-of-hospital setting, but only selected emergency interventions have proved to be safe or effective. Endotracheal intubation (the insertion of an emergency breathing tube into the trachea) is an important and high-profile procedure performed by paramedics. ⋯ These findings indicate frequent errors associated with this life-saving technique. These events might be emblematic of larger issues in the structure and delivery of out-of-hospital emergency care.