Ray Moynihan delivered this video presentation, as part of the multi-part Health and Healthcare Series, initiated by the Salzburg Global Seminar. In this conference entitled, "The Greatest Untapped Resource in Healthcare? Informing and Involving Patients in Decisions about their Medical Care," participants from 19 countries, gathered in Salzburg, Austria to discuss the pros and cons of informed patient decision making.
This conference was organized in collaboration with the Foundation for Informed Decision Making, a non-profit organization in the United States, leading changes to ensure that health care decisions are made with the active participation of fully informed patients, and with the support of the Wellcome Trust.
Bio
Ray Moynihan
Ray Moynihan is an award-winning journalist, author, documentary maker and academic researcher, based in Australia. Reporting across print, radio, television and social media, Ray has worked at the ABC TV's investigative program, Four Corners and the 7:30 Report, ABC Radio's Background Briefing and The Australian Financial Review.
Since 2006 he has been a conjoint lecturer at the University of Newcastle, Australia. The winner of many awards for his investigative journalism, Ray's 2005 book Selling Sickness was described in the New York Times as a "compelling case" and has been translated into a dozen languages.
Science and art of preventing disease, prolonging life, and promoting health through organized community efforts. These include sanitation, control of contagious infections, hygiene education, early diagnosis and preventive treatment, and adequate living standards. It requires understanding not only of epidemiology, nutrition, and antiseptic practices but also of social science. Historical public health measures included quarantine of leprosy victims in the Middle Ages and efforts to improve sanitation following the 14th-century plague epidemics. Population increases in Europe brought with them increased awareness of infant deaths and a proliferation of hospitals. Britain's Public Health Act of 1848 established a special public health ministry. In the U.S., public health is studied and coordinated on a national level by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention; internationally, the World Health Organization plays an equivalent role.
This is a topic long ignored in terms of proper research which should be compulsory viewing for anyone who wants to make the best of money spent on national health systems.