In a new and important book entitled The Managed
Care Blues and How to Cure Them, a lifetime consumer
advocate and a surgeon who witnessed the excesses and unaccountable
errors of his colleagues under fee for service explain
with deft hands the promise of managed care, its problems,
and solutions to them. Walter Zelman and Robert Berenson
show empathy for the consumer backlash, provider resentment,
and the patients' rights movement that has spawned
a thousand bills to prevent possibly unethical actions.
Yet they believe these efforts to regulate managed care
are misdirected and will prevent it from realizing its
potential.