A system in need of change

The newest installment in the recently published Pathways to Quality Health Care series by the National Academies Press (NAP) bluntly states:

The overall quality of healthcare delivered to Americans is worse than it should be. While many quality improvement efforts have been undertaken, their success has been limited by current payment systems. The existing systems do not reflect the relative value of health care services in important aspects of quality...

Rewarding Provider Performance: Aligning Incentives in Medicare (Pathways to Quality Health Care Series)
(2007, Open Book, NAP, 227pp)

How medical care is organized, financed and delivered is a current concern of The American College of Physicians (ACP) as reported in a Monday Reuters story and voiced in ACP's State of the Nation's Health Care 2007: ACP Releases Comprehensive Reforms to Move towards Patient-Centered Care.