Health care cost containment: rationing medical technology

Effective and efficient delivery of health care is one of the critical issues facing the nation today. Currently, nearly 13% of the nation's GDP in spent on Health Care. Perhaps one-half of the increase in health care costs have been linked to the acquisition of new medical technology. This paper examines some of the issues relating to the acquisition and dissemination of the use of medical technology by acute care and outpatient facilities and discusses the rationing of medical technology. The paper concludes by identifying some of the approaches to controlling health care costs through the rationing of technology that have been presented in the literature and outlines the evolving new paradigm that is being advanced to address the issues of cost containment and access to health care.