LAWS 2159 ‑ Health Systems Law and Policy

CREDIT HOURS: 3

Traditionally, health law scholarship has focused on the physician-patient relationship; however, increasingly, lawyers are turning their attention to larger system issues and the complex web of relationships between governments, private insurers, doctors and other health professionals, public and private hospitals, pharmaceutical companies, and patients. This course will focus on the structure and dynamic of Canada’s healthcare system. It will locate Canada’s system amongst the variety of approaches taken internationally to the financing and allocation of health insurance and health services and to the regulation of the quality of health services. Issues to be explored include what different theories of distributive justice demand in terms of access to healthcare, the extent of market failure in health insurance and health service markets, how to determine what services are publicly funded and means of review of these decisions, how to ensure the accountability of decision-makers, why the present system fails Aboriginal peoples, regulation of privately financed healthcare (in vitro services, drugs, medical equipment, home care, etc.), the shift from institutional care to care in the home, the need for reform of the medical malpractice system, managed care, and general issues of privatization, deregulation and reregulation.

Prerequisite(s): None.
Co-requisite(s): None.
Assessment Method: Major research paper (60%), policy formulation and reflection exercise (30%), general class participation (10%).
Restrictions: None.