I highly recommend this book; it enraged me. It's a great, in-depth look at just how powerful the "healthcare" lobby in the US is, and is a great argument for the public healthcare option being considered by the current administration.

While the story of the book is about how the man writing it went about getting care for his cancer-stricken, uninsured adult daughter, the research he did in pursuit of that brings to light some very chilling things about the US system of medicine.

One of the things that struck me hardest was this: the US government spent millions of dollars researching and developing taxol, one of the most common cancer drugs in use today. In some truly horrifying and probably illegal sleight-of-hand, the decades of research, production, marketing and even the generic name was turned over to for-profit pharmaceutical giant, Bristol-Meyers Squibb, in a way that did not benefit either the US government or the US people. Further, all federal supplies of the source ingredient (the Pacific yew tree) were also granted to BMS for nearly no cost. This company then produced & marketed the drug to make billions. Worse, even the US government programs (Medicare & VA) had to pay full price to use the drug for their patients.

Bristol-Meyers Squibb & the US government conspired to screw US citizens & cancer patients completely over.

Again, I highly recommend this book, but be prepared to be angry when reading it, and to have your view of our medical industry significantly changed. ( )

This book sheds light into some aspects of the US health care system. It reads as a novel, and is a very personal story. The author's adult daughter discovered she had cancer, as an uninsured artist. He decided she had her hands full dealing with the disease, and took over the financial aspects related to her condition. Initially stymied by the complex and confusing statements, he set out to determine what he actually owed for the services received. As a retired PhD Geophysicist, he applied his talents for dealing with confusing "data sets" to unravel this mystery. The results is an easy to read story which starts with the specifics of his daughter's case, but then zooms out to explain how health care financing works in this country, and compares it to how other countries systems are structured. He explains how cost shifting works, and the difference between the bill one might receive in the mail, versus what he ended up paying. I found it to be a moving story, and an excellent explanation of an otherwise complex topic.

Davis's Mired in the Health Care Morass is a geeky look at how the medical billing system operates (and screws so many of us over). Pros: you gain a visceral understanding of these problems. Cons: limited in geographical scope, data is already out of date. ( )

This book is packed with a lot of good information. Unfortunately, the author throws around a lot of trees without letting the reader see the forest. He would have done well to have read The visual display of quantitative information by Edward R. Tufte before sitting down to write. Every other page has a table of data, which is fine for a corporate or government report, but not for a book whose audience is the general public. It doesn't matter to me that a particular hospital spent x dollars on y cost codes, what I want to see is how that expenditure compares to other countries or regions, other cost codes, or how it's changed over time, which could have been conveyed by a well drawn chart or graph. After the 20th table, I stopped even looking at the captions. A more judicious use of graphs, with an appendix containing master tables at the end for those who wanted hard data, would made this book far better. Once you get around the presentation of the data, the author took on the Herculean task of unraveling the ins and outs of the US health care system and did a very thorough job of it. Anyone who believes that the US has the best and most efficient health care system in the world is clearly smoking crack. Morass is a gross understatement. Somehow, the author was able to pull a lot of information together and use it to negotiate "reasonable" rates for his (uninsured) daughter's health care, and he lays out in detail exactly how he did it. ( )

In 1994 Patricia Davis faced an increasingly common dilemma. Symptoms indicated that she should seek medical care immediately. Having just started a new job, with health insurance that didn't kick in for six more months, she was trying to put off seeing a doctor until then. Three months into this job the need to seek medical attention had become inescapable. Her diagnosis was lung cancer. She did not have insurance yet and her cancer was now a “pre-existing condition”. Now she was faced with tens of thousands of dollars in potential medical bills that she could not afford to pay. Enter her father, Neil Davis, who offered to pay her bills to the best of his ability.

It didn't take Davis long to notice huge discrepancies in the billing. Thus began his education on medical billing practices in the United States. He discovered that uninsured patients are billed fees that are astronomically higher than the fees the paid by insurance companies on behalf of insured patients and by Medicaid on behalf of Medicaid recipients. This is to cover expenses that have not been paid either by indigent patients or by ordinary middle class patients who cannot cover their uninsured expenses. The many charts and statistics he uses to illustrate his findings can be hard to understand at times, but believe it or not they accurately illustrate his point that the complexity of the American system creates expense. He skewers some fondly held myths about the U.S. Health care system and shines light on the health care systems in other nations. He also gives his prescription for how the U.S. Health care system can be changed.

Neil Davis has experiences in being a consumer of health care that most of us never hope to have, but which will become increasingly commonplace as the health care becomes increasingly broken. His answers to the health care crises (universal, uniform payments, distributed to patients regardless of ability to pay, regulation of drug companies) are well thought out and do not come from a place of a particular political ideology but instead from his own experiences and research. His book is well researched and a convincing call to radically overhaul the American health care system from someone who has experienced the worst that the American health care system has to offer. ( )

Less of a personal journey than an exploration into the true costs of medical treatment in the United States today, and where the money goes. For anyone concerned with injustice, inequalities, or lack of checks within the system; or anyone who is concerned that they cannot afford the medical care they or their loved ones need, this clear and non-judgmental book written by a layman with no preconceptions or industry biases is highly recommended. ( )

Mired in the Healthcare Morass (MHC) is a book that appears to be preaching to the choir. Except for the hardcore of the right-wing, most acknowledge that there is something wrong with the nature of the healthcare industry in the United States.

A myriad of books have been written on this topic; however, Mr. Davis' strength lies in the fact that he writes it from the perspective of a consumer. It could be argued that he is not qualified to write a book about the health care industry as merely a consumer. Certainly, economists may be more capable of addressing the macro issues of national healthcare, and pundits the political ramifications; however, that really isn't the purpose of Mr. Davis' book. Rather, it reads like a good summary (with a clearly liberal bent) on the state of the health care industry.

And, unlike economic and political pundits, Mr. Davis doesn't shy away from actually providing a solution. As he says, "What is needed is single-payer universal healthcare ... the most economical form is a fully socialistic system like the United Kingdom's (and the VA system as well) in which the government owns and operates the hospitals and hires healthcare providers."

The book, however, is more a introduction to the issue of healthcare and should be a considered a platform for jumping into more in-depth works (for those interested in this issue in the first place). ( )

I know I am not the intended audience for this book and my review reflects this. Like the other reviewers, I am a health care consumer, but additionally I have been a health care professional for 25 years. I am a consultant, advising physicians on how to manage and improve their practices.

While there was some very important information in "Mired in the Health Care Morass" it suffered from two major flaws:

1. The author (Neil Davis) had experience was with the Alaskan health care system but he made generalizations about the entire American system based on this experience. Some of these generalizations led to factual inaccuracies. The American health care system is incredibly fragmented and advice that may be appropriate for Alaskans may not be appropriate for the rest of the country.

2. "Mired in the Health Care Morass" was really two different books in one. The first could have been titled Health Care Reimbursement for Dummies. The second could have been called The Crisis in American Health Care. I would have preferred reading just the first one. Most patients have no idea how health care billing works until they are faced with a financial crisis. A book like Mr. Davis' would be very helpful in leading them through the process, especially if they live in Alaska. I think if he crystalized some of his main points in pamphlet form it would be a very valuable asset. I don't think, however, that he is qualified to assess the health care system as a whole. I think this task would have better left to economists and other policy experts. There have already been many books written on this subject and many are better.

In closing, I think he imparts valuable information for Alaskans attempting to understand health care reimbursement and I would recommend it highly for them. However, while I would recommend that all Americans become more knowleadgeable about health care issues, I don't think this book would necessary help them. ( )

An excellent book that focuses on the state of health care costs for the uninsured. The under-insured and the insured have much to gain from the exhaustive statistical details in this book. Written by the father of an adult daughter who found herself with a cancer diagnosis and uninsured, decided to document his (and his daughter's) journey through the maze of how a patient is charged the oftentimes unbelievable amounts of money for treatment. The book is not a sentimental one but a refreshing look at a father's attempt to understand how the health care system in the US charges for each procedure, medication, in and outpatient visit and makes a compelling argument and a very strong case for reform in the health insurance "industry" along with an accurate look at how we as consumers can and should take charge of our health care. Otherwise, we may end up paying for mistakes (documented in the book) of the various personnel in making coding errors or charging according to outdated schedules. Anyone facing a chronic disease--anyone who uses their health insurance at all, this book is an easy read with documentation. The only drawback I found was that the author cited many websites for sources. I would prefer more print and peer-reviewed citations however, these may be difficult to obtain considering the subject matter. ( )

what truly sets Neil Davis' Mired in the Health Care Morass apart from other commentaries on the United States health care system is the perspective of a consumer. He was driven to write this book from his actual experience of navigating through the tangled web of health care on behalf of his daughter, who was an uninsured lung cancer patient.

Davis' research is extensive, and his ability to dissect the unreasonably complex health care process is unrivaled. Due to the complexity of the process his book has a great number of charts and diagrams that do wonders to help the reader make sense of it all.

Davis illustrates the problems of the current health care system, from the pharmaceutical companies and their lobbyists to the private insurance companies. His analysis of the universal health care systems in other Western nations discredits the false claims and fear-mongering perpetuated by the right-wing that a single-payer system would be more expensive and less efficient.

The learning I received about health care from Mired in the Health Care Morass would have taken months of research if I were to try to have done it on my own.

Mired in the Health Care Morass should be required reading for our elected officials and every American that knows that our health care system is broken and something must be done about it. ( )