National Nurses United

12 N A T I O N A L N U R S E W W W . N A T I O N A L N U R S E S U N I T E D . O R G J A N U A R Y | F E B R U A R Y 2 0 1 4 I t's 2014, which means the bulk of the Affordable Care Act is now in effect. While most of the mainstream media has focused on whether patients will finally be able to find afford- able health insurance through the programs it creates (or not), very little attention has been paid to discussing how the wide-ranging law is being capitalized upon by healthcare cor- porations, and how some of its other incentives and provisions change the registered nurse's scope of practice, speed up the computerization of healthcare, and encourage fundamental changes to healthcare delivery and systems. In fact, these changes are redefining the meaning of "care" that healthcare providers, like you, are expected to provide. Registered nurses do not need to know every minute aspect of the Affordable Care Act, but they should understand in general what goals the legislation claims to set and the kinds of problems it claims to solve. U.S. healthcare policymakers often can't agree on much, but the one thing almost all agree on is that the United States spends way too much money per capita per year on healthcare, about $8,508 accord- ing to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. It's the highest of all countries in the world. But for that price tag, we get less-than-stellar results. Our infant mortality and longevity rates are far behind all other Western, developed nations. National Nurses United has long argued that to lower our expen- diture on healthcare and promote a single, high standard of good care, we need to remove the profit motive from healthcare and run it like the public utility that it really should be. All people need things like clean water, electricity, police and fire rescue. These services are critical to sustaining human life. Accordingly, we often operate the systems that provide these services as a public entity, for the public good and not for profit. It should be the same with healthcare. All people have bodies. We all fall sick, have babies, grow old, get into accidents, sustain injuries, die. For this reason, NNU has long advocated for, at the very least, a STAFF REPORT TROUBLE ON THE HORIZON Top five things RNs must know about where healthcare is heading

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