Stanfield’s Introduction to Health Professions 7th Edition

Book Preface

Now in full-color, the seventh edition of an Introduction to Health Professions provides comprehensive coverage of all the major health professions. This product is designed for students who are interested in pursuing a health-related career but are still exploring and have not yet decided on a specific career. The Seventh Edition outlines more than 75 careers and touches on every major facet of the field, including a description of the profession and typical work settings; educational, licensure, and certification requirements; salary and growth projections; and Internet resources on educational programs and state requirements for licensure and/or certification. In addition, this resource provides a thorough review of the U.S. healthcare delivery system, managed care, healthcare financing, reimbursement, insurance coverage, Medicare, Medicaid, and the impact of new technology on healthcare services. Information on career preparation and development are also included. All chapters are updated to reflect current demographics and new policies.

HOW IS THIS BOOK ORGANIZED?

The new edition of this text has been reorganized into five sections
• Part I—The Healthcare System in the United States. This section provides an overview of the healthcare system in the United States, with separate chapters on categories of health services, financing health care, the impact of aging on demands for healthcare providers, health care reform, and medical and information technology.
• NEW! Part II—Jobs and Careers. This section focuses on career planning and career development.
• NEW! Parts III through V contain chapters on individual careers that are organized so that students will be able to quickly identify a particular career of interest. Each chapter is organized to follow the same general format, making it easy for students to explore many different health careers. Each chapter follows the same format with a description of the profession and typical work setting; educational, licensure and certification requirements; salary and growth projections; and Internet resources on educational programs and requirements for licensure and/or certification. For example, in the chapter on dentistry, the career is described based on the education and training requirements from most education—dentist—to least education—dental assistant. For each career within the dentistry profession, the student has access to the usual responsibilities, work setting, salary, and expected demand for that career. Each chapter lists Internet resources to explore educational programs as well as state requirements for licensure and certification options for advancing in the profession.
• Part III—Healthcare Practitioners and Technicians. This section is the core of the product and contains 20 chapters directed at health careers that involve direct patient contact and care, ranging from diagnosis to treatment to education and counseling and medical or surgical interventions.
• Part IV—Healthcare Support Personnel. This section contains five chapters directed at health careers that support or supplement other health professionals in providing ongoing care for patients—medical and nursing assistants, personal, home, and psychiatric aides; medical information technology; and massage and recreation therapy.
• Part V—Health-Related Professions. This section focuses on health-related professionals who usually do not have direct contact with human patients but often have an impact on human health—veterinary medicine and occupational health and environmental sciences.