This book is a personal testimony of faith in the future and in the
progression to better health and a better life. It is the testament of a
rough and ready measuring device - a practising physician who sought to
compare and contrast three systems of medical care to see what can be
distilled from them to help us all in achieving better services for
medical care. Medical care as a human and civic right is the con- cern
of us all. Seeking to live longer and in good health we depend on
medical, social and welfare services to attain this goal. Yet it is
quite obvious that there are limits and dilemmas that prevent anything
but an unsatisfactory compromise. The resources that are available
cannot meet all the calls. How then can we make the best use of the
resources that we have? This must be the theme for this book. What can
we learn from each other for the com- mon good? Since we all are facing
the same common prob- lems, how do we go about resolving them? For
example, how do the medical care services in the USSR, USA and UK cope
with an acute heart attack, with a middle-aged woman with depression,
with a brain-damaged child, with a road accident or with a case of
measles? These are the common human factors involved.
