TY - CHAP M1 - Book, Section TI - Introduction to Edition 23 A1 - Venes, Donald PY - 2017 T2 - Taber's® Cyclopedic Medical Dictionary, 23e AB - The last several years have been heady, and at times bewildering, for health care professionals. We have witnessed revolutions in our ability to provide care for previously unmanageable diseases, like chronic hepatitis C, only to uncover new arthropod-borne infections, like Chikungunya and Zika virus-associated illnesses. We have disseminated care standards to combat iatrogenesis (not just within hospitals, but nationally and internationally), and then realized that some recent shibboleths (like providing opioids for chronic pain relief) have produced tragically increased death rates. Prediabetes, diabetes mellitus, and obesity have reached epidemic proportions even as our understanding of healthful nutrition and physical fitness has reached new heights. We repeatedly create new solutions to health care delivery shortcomings, only to discover that the costs of providing diagnostic studies, medicines, and invasive procedures puts many medical services out of economic reach for individuals, communities, and nations. We strive to improve public health, only to find that lead contaminates the water supply of many cities. More than ever we've grown to recognize that health care must become more efficient, more effective, more rational, and, at the same time, more caring and personal. SN - PB - F.A. Davis Company CY - New York, NY Y2 - 2024/04/19 UR - fadavispt.mhmedical.com/content.aspx?aid=1147765075 ER -