The Dartmouth Atlas of Health Care in Pennsylvania, a part of the Dartmouth Atlas of Health Care series of publications, demonstrates again that the way healthcare resources are distributed and used, at the local level, challenges the conventional wisdom that illness determines the use of medical care, and that the supply of medical care arises in response to the demand for it.

Describes American health care resources and how they are used, as well as a detailed description of the physician workforce in the U.S.

This Atlas builds on the analyses presented in the 2006 edition. As before, the focus is on Medicare beneficiaries who had severe chronic illnesses and were in their last two years of life. This edition both updates the earlier analyses to encompass more recent data (through 2005) and expands the scope to include all sectors of care covered by the Medicare program. This Atlas also proposes new ways of thinking about how to achieve better care coordination and reduce the overuse of acute care hospital services. It offers concrete recommendations on the ways different stakeholders can use the new data - from choosing the right provider to reforming the U.S. health care system.