Terms Comparison Paper

HCS/552
December 16, 2013
Dr. Vernita Davis

Terms Comparison Paper According to Getzen (2007), " money drives the health care system just as it does many other activities in a modern industrial society" (p. 2). Economy is driven by money. There will exchange of money for services rendered and the purchase of goods. In this day and age, you no longer are able to get goods or services by offering the seller a type of service or some other type of goods in exchange. Those equal barter trade is a thing of the past. In this paper, we will identify three terms usually used in economics and health care. We will compare these three terms and differentiate what it may mean in health care and economics.
The three terms used for this purpose are trade, finance, and funds.
Three Terms
Trade
As Getzen (2007) noted all people are involved in some kind of barter or trade, which could be goods, services, money, time, favors, and information for the purpose of being better. Both parties must benefit of the trade. Trading is exchanging. The term trading in economics, it is the exchange of goods between a buyer and a seller. The seller will offer particular goods for the exchange of money from the buyer. The seller will gain a profit from the trade which boost economy. Trade in terms of health care, though the same as exchanging goods, health care more so offer services and medical care. When a provider is offering services to a patient like seeing in primary care for annual medical history and physical, or an orthopedic surgeon offering a patient to operate on the patient's knee to correct a degenerative joint disease, both primary care and surgeon will be charging a patient for surgery or annual visit. During the annual visit, the patient requested to be given the influenza vaccine. Instead of the customary charge of $100 for the visit, the doctor will charge the influenza vaccination, in addition to the visit. Whereas in economics, a customer can buy a shirt sold for $10 and the exchange is final. Although both involved exchange, health care is a little more complicated that just buying a shirt. For a surgeon, not all intricate details are discussed with a patient all the other charges on top of the surgeon's fee (Getzen, 2007). The fee can be overinflated, a charge for follow up visit is separate, charged separately for equipments used, and bandages. There is exchange in both, but varies in charges and how it is presented.
Finance
Finance involves payment of something over time and involving other parties to help with the payment. It does not involve just the buyer and the seller (Getzen, 2007). A good example is when a person buys a car he or she has to get a loan from a bank to finance the payments in the next 30 to 60 months. He or she may put some monies as down payment, but the rest of the payments has to be paid for a period of time. In health care, financing is complicated. Individuals can get financing from either public or private insurance where plans are from pooled funds and risks are shared across millions of people in order to provide payments for health care (Getzen, 2007). For a health care organization, administration will offer health insurance to its employees for a discounted group price with the insurance company taking risks on taking a group that could have chronic medical conditions. For an individual, he or she gets the benefit of pooled funds from consumers across the US under this one insurance company by paying a set of premium payment for services, expensive surgeries, expensive state of the art diagnostic procedures that otherwise he or she cannot afford to pay on his or her own. Many people share the expenses. Public financing can be Medicare benefits. During a person's working life, he or she pays an amount of money taken from his or her paycheck to be pooled to pay the medical expenses for the elderly. When the time comes for that person to retire, he or she can avail of that pooled funds that he or she has been paying for all his or her working life. According to Shi (2012), "financing often determines who has access to health care and who does not" (p. 201).
Funds
Funds are monies used to pay for the goods and services rendered. Funds can come from savings a person has accumulated over the years, and it can be charitable donation from families and friends. You can get funds from wages for a day's work. It could be from inheritance. Funds for health care are from private or public health insurance (Shi, 2012). These funds are able to help an individual pay for services rendered by medical health professional to treat a medical condition or ways to promote health. These funds can help finance the surgery, and expensive medications.
Conclusion
We identified three terms trade, finance, and funds. These terms were compared and differentiated in health care and economics. Trade is an exchange of goods and services between a buyer and a seller. Trade and finance are complicated in health care, and funds can come from different sources. Money drives our economy.

References
Getzen, T.E. (2007). Health economics and financing (3rd ed.). Retrieved from The University of Phoenix eBook Collection database.
Shi, L. (2012). Delivery of health care in America: A systems approach (5th ed.). : Jones & Bartlett. Retrieved from University of Phoenix eBook Collection database.