'Life, death, and politics' treating Chicago's uninsured

David Ansell, MD, the vice president for clinical affairs and chief medical officer at Rush University Medical Center. But he began his medical career in 1978 at Cook County Hospital, Chicago's public hospital, where he worked as an attending physician for almost two decades. His social history of the hospital, County: Life, Death and Politics at Chicago's Public Hospital, details his own time on the wards—and examines health care in America from the perspective of the uninsured. Working at County, Ansell says, made him realize just how much the current payment system drives health care inequalities. "There's a misunderstanding that if you just go to the [emergency room], that's healthcare," he says. "It's not...And I don't think the public or politicians really understand that. I think the last health reform attempt which is being bandied about ? we don't know what's going to happen—is likely to fall short with regards to equity."