The People S Hospital

“Nuila’s storytelling gifts place him alongside colleagues like Atul Gawande.” —Los Angeles Times This “compelling mixture of health care policy and gripping stories from the frontlines of medicine” (The Guardian) explores the question: where does an uninsured person go when turned away by hospitals, clinics, and doctors? Here, we follow the lives of five uninsured Houstonians as their struggle for survival leads them to a hospital that prioritizes people over profit. First, we meet Stephen, the restaurant franchise manager who signed up for his company’s lowest priced plan, only to find himself facing insurmountable costs after a cancer diagnosis. Then Christian—a young college student and retail worker who can’t seem to get an accurate diagnosis, let alone treatment, for his debilitating knee pain. Geronimo, thirty-six years old, has liver failure, but his meager disability check disqualifies him for Medicaid—and puts a life-saving transplant just out of reach. Roxana, who’s lived in the community without a visa for more than two decades, suffers from complications related to her cancer treatment. And finally, there’s Ebonie, a young mother whose high-risk pregnancy endangers her life. Whether due to immigration status, income, or the vagaries of state Medicaid law, all five are denied access to care. For all five, this exclusion could prove life-threatening. Each patient eventually lands at Ben Taub, the county hospital where Dr. Nuila has worked for over a decade. Nuila delves with empathy into the experiences of his patients, braiding their dramas into a singular narrative that contradicts the established idea that the only way to receive good health care is with good insurance. As readers follow the moving twists and turns in each patient’s story, it’s impossible to deny that our system is broken—and that Ben Taub’s innovative model, where patient care is more important than insurance payments, could help light the path forward.

How do medical staff offer care and hope to patients and families when faced with the mayhem and lottery of a broken healthcare system? 'A fascinating and beautifully written memoir that reminds us what we have with our NHS - and what we stand to lose' Christie Watson 'A tour de force... lyrical and riveting prose' Abraham Verghese, author of Cutting for Stone 'Nuila details the horrific reality of the American healthcare system from the front lines, and shows us why it doesn't have to be like that' Sally Hayden, author of My Fourth Time, We Drowned The People's Hospital is the story of how Ben Taub Hospital strives to provide healthcare to Houston's most vulnerable population, against the background of the chaos of American healthcare. By telling the frequently heartbreaking stories of patients who have had to battle their desperate financial circumstances as well as life-threatening illness - from Rogelio, a twenty-something, undocumented immigrant from Mexico recently diagnosed with kidney disease, to Roxana, a Salvadoran woman who appears in ER after a life-saving surgery resulted in her developing potentially fatal complications - and many more. These are extraordinary stories in which doctors are tied up with complex moral questions about money versus healthcare, and patients manipulate their health conditions in dangerous ways in order to be eligible for life-saving treatment that they cannot afford.

How do medical staff offer care and hope to patients and families when patients' needs become embroiled in the semantics of citizenship status, financial resources and obstructions of bureaucracy outside of hospital walls?The People's Hospital is the story of how Ben Taub Hospital and the Harris Health System provide excellent and affordable healthcare to Houston's most vulnerable population. Nuila shares the history of Harris Health System by examining the stories of patients that have received care through it - from Rogelio, a twenty-something undocumented immigrant from Mexico recently diagnosed with End Stage Renal Disease, to Roxana, a Salvadoran woman who appears in ER after a life-saving surgery resulted in her developing dry gangrene of her arms and legs as a complication, and many more. These are extraordinary stories in which doctors are tied up with complex moral questions about money vs healthcare, and patients manipulate their health conditions in dangerous ways in order to be eligible for lifesaving treatment that they cannot afford.

This is a history of the religious, health, medical and political contexts of Natal and South Africa from the late 1800s to the 1970s.

Watch the hospital come to life before your very eyes in this fun and interactive board book! Clever paper technology will amaze young children as they watch the scenes change as if by magic. The perfect boredom-buster for when you can't get outdoors, and a wonderful way of teaching about all the amazing work our health carers do. In the hospital, all the staff are busy doing their everyday tasks. Find out what some of our hospital workers get up to in their working day, and watch the scenes change thanks to Venetian window paper technology. With a winning combination of bold, expressive artwork and engaging rhyming text, this interactive, bright, bold board book is sure to become a household favourite! The People Who Help Us board book series introduces children to the important jobs that our carers and key workers do--something which is now more important and timely than ever. Say thank you to our key workers with this playful interactive board book series.

Experts estimate that as many as 98,000 people die in any given year from medical errors that occur in hospitals. That's more than die from motor vehicle accidents, breast cancer, or AIDSâ€"three causes that receive far more public attention. Indeed, more people die annually from medication errors than from workplace injuries. Add the financial cost to the human tragedy, and medical error easily rises to the top ranks of urgent, widespread public problems. To Err Is Human breaks the silence that has surrounded medical errors and their consequenceâ€"but not by pointing fingers at caring health care professionals who make honest mistakes. After all, to err is human. Instead, this book sets forth a national agendaâ€"with state and local implicationsâ€"for reducing medical errors and improving patient safety through the design of a safer health system. This volume reveals the often startling statistics of medical error and the disparity between the incidence of error and public perception of it, given many patients' expectations that the medical profession always performs perfectly. A careful examination is made of how the surrounding forces of legislation, regulation, and market activity influence the quality of care provided by health care organizations and then looks at their handling of medical mistakes. Using a detailed case study, the book reviews the current understanding of why these mistakes happen. A key theme is that legitimate liability concerns discourage reporting of errorsâ€"which begs the question, "How can we learn from our mistakes?" Balancing regulatory versus market-based initiatives and public versus private efforts, the Institute of Medicine presents wide-ranging recommendations for improving patient safety, in the areas of leadership, improved data collection and analysis, and development of effective systems at the level of direct patient care. To Err Is Human asserts that the problem is not bad people in health careâ€"it is that good people are working in bad systems that need to be made safer. Comprehensive and straightforward, this book offers a clear prescription for raising the level of patient safety in American health care. It also explains how patients themselves can influence the quality of care that they receive once they check into the hospital. This book will be vitally important to federal, state, and local health policy makers and regulators, health professional licensing officials, hospital administrators, medical educators and students, health caregivers, health journalists, patient advocatesâ€"as well as patients themselves. First in a series of publications from the Quality of Health Care in America, a project initiated by the Institute of Medicine