Navigating the Cultures of Health Care and Health Insurance
Highly Skilled Migrants in the U.S.
9781800083653
9781800083660
Distributed for UCL Press
Navigating the Cultures of Health Care and Health Insurance
Highly Skilled Migrants in the U.S.
A qualitative and quantitative approach to the study of foreign patients’ utilization and assessment of health care in the United States.
What are the barriers preventing migrants from accessing and successfully using health care in their new home country? Do these barriers vary based on the migrants’ country of origin? And are they a problem for highly skilled migrants, who often have well-paid jobs and health insurance provided by their employers? Based on field research conducted in the Washington DC area, Navigating the Cultures of Health Care and Health Insurance brings together mixed methods, qualitative, and quantitative approaches to the study of foreign patients’ utilization and assessment of health care in the United States. Through interviews with both health care providers and patients, attitudes toward health insurance and medical treatment are compared for migrants from three countries with very different cultural backgrounds and health insurance systems: Germany, India, and Japan.
What are the barriers preventing migrants from accessing and successfully using health care in their new home country? Do these barriers vary based on the migrants’ country of origin? And are they a problem for highly skilled migrants, who often have well-paid jobs and health insurance provided by their employers? Based on field research conducted in the Washington DC area, Navigating the Cultures of Health Care and Health Insurance brings together mixed methods, qualitative, and quantitative approaches to the study of foreign patients’ utilization and assessment of health care in the United States. Through interviews with both health care providers and patients, attitudes toward health insurance and medical treatment are compared for migrants from three countries with very different cultural backgrounds and health insurance systems: Germany, India, and Japan.
Table of Contents
List of figures and tables
Acknowledgements
1 Introduction
2 Context and mythology
3 ‘I really dislike insurance… I don’t know how the concept works’: The culture of health insurance
4 ‘I saw an army of doctors walk in…’: Highly skilled migrants’ experiences with health care and biomedical diversity in the US
5 ‘Here I do think before I go to the doctor’: Highly skilled migrants’ barriers to accessing and utilizing health care in the US
6 ‘Take a vacation, go back to India and get a treatment there’: Transnational health care practices and strategies navigating US health care and health insurance culture
7 Conclusion and outlook
References
Index
Acknowledgements
1 Introduction
2 Context and mythology
3 ‘I really dislike insurance… I don’t know how the concept works’: The culture of health insurance
4 ‘I saw an army of doctors walk in…’: Highly skilled migrants’ experiences with health care and biomedical diversity in the US
5 ‘Here I do think before I go to the doctor’: Highly skilled migrants’ barriers to accessing and utilizing health care in the US
6 ‘Take a vacation, go back to India and get a treatment there’: Transnational health care practices and strategies navigating US health care and health insurance culture
7 Conclusion and outlook
References
Index