Group Health Association : a portrait of a health maintenance organization /

This history of the Group Health Association, one of the nation's first health maintenance organizations (HMOs), is an important one whose history includes a 1938 antitrust case against the American Medical Association, which tried to prevent physicians and hospitals from supporting what the AMA felt was the advent of socialized medicine. Based on the records of the Association, this book is interesting and important, and it deserves a wide readership. It provides historical background to the modern debate over expanding the US's health program and on the advent of prepaid health plans. The extensive notes and references provide a useful bibliography. Berkowitz and Wolff add a great amount of information to previous studies by Lawrence D. Brown (Politics and Health Care Organization: HMOs as Federal Policy, CH Jul '83) and Paul Starr (The Social Transformation of American Medicine, CH, Apr '83). Highly recommended for anyone seeking to learn more about the history of the Group Health Association and gain insights into the problems facing HMOs in today's society. Upper-division and graduate collections. -M. Kaufman, Westfield State College