title: The health care system under French national health insurance: lessons for health reform in the United States.
abstract: The French health system combines universal coverage with a public-private mix of hospital and ambulatory care and a higher volume of service provision than in the United States. Although the system is far from perfect, its indicators of health status and consumer satisfaction are high; its expenditures, as a share of gross domestic product, are far lower than in the United States; and patients have an extraordinary degree of choice among providers. Lessons for the United States include the importance of government's role in providing a statutory framework for universal health insurance; recognition that piecemeal reform can broaden a partial program (like Medicare) to cover, eventually, the entire population; and understanding that universal coverage can be achieved without excluding private insurers from the supplementary insurance market.
authors.affiliation: Wagner School, New York University, New York, USA. victor.rodwin@nyu.edu
authors.forename: Victor G
authors.initials: VG
authors.lastname: Rodwin
mesh_terms: D003258:Consumer Behavior; D005602:France / Q000453:epidemiology; D018166:Health Care Reform / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence; D006304:Health Status; D006801:Humans; D038622:Internationality; D017146:Models, Organizational; D009310:National Health Insurance, United States; D009313:National Health Programs / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence / Q000458:organization & administration*; D011057:Politics; D017149:Private Sector; D017150:Public Sector; D014481:United States; D019472:Universal Health Insurance / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence / Q000458:organization & administration*