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The Prepared Patient: Your Guide to Surviving the Health Care System - Softcover

Adirim, Terry

 
9781421454825: The Prepared Patient: Your Guide to Surviving the Health Care System
Softcover
ISBN 10: 1421454823 ISBN 13: 9781421454825
Publisher: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2026

Synopsis

A clear, practical guide to becoming an informed and empowered patient.

Most Americans are overwhelmed by a health care system dense with paperwork, opaque rules, and high-stakes decisions made under pressure. In The Prepared Patient, physician and health policy leader Terry Adirim, MD, MPH, offers a patient-centered guide to navigating this system with clarity, confidence, and control.

Dr. Adirim introduces readers to the "White Binder Patient"―a model inspired by caregivers of medically complex children who arrive prepared, informed, and ready to advocate. Expanding this approach to all patients, she argues that health information literacy and organization are the most immediate and powerful tools that individuals can use to protect their health and financial well-being. Through patient stories, this book addresses the most common and costly friction points patients face: choosing and understanding insurance plans; finding and coordinating care across providers; managing surprise billing and medical debt; and asserting patient rights when coverage is denied. Dr. Adirim uses her decades of experience as a physician and health policy leader to show how small, intentional actions―organizing medical information, asking better questions, preparing for appointments―empower patients and dramatically shift outcomes.

The Prepared Patient is a foundational, enduring guide for patients and caregivers who need to make the system work for their health now and plan for the future. By guiding readers through a better way to access and organize their medical care, Dr. Adirim prepares readers for a more successful approach to surviving modern health care.

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About the Author

Terry Adirim, MD, MPH, the former Assistant Secretary of Defense for Health Affairs, is a physician with decades of experience in pediatric emergency medicine, health policy, and medical administration.

"About this title" may belong to another edition of this title.

Publisher
Johns Hopkins University Press
Publication date
2026
Language
English
ISBN 10 
1421454823
ISBN 13 
9781421454825
Binding
Paperback
Number of pages
408