HEALTH SYSTEMS AND THE LAWS OF THERMODYNAMICS

  Health systems are social and living systems

• Social and living systems are networked and highly nonlinear

• Such systems are governed by the laws of thermodynamics

• Power is work ( energy expenditure ) per time- unit

• Endurance capacity of man and his health systems is determined by the factor of

the " effort " that can be resumed to discomfort in the form of "fatigue" .

• Zeroth Law of Thermodynamics : If a system A (service provider ) is in thermal equilibrium to a system B ( service consumer ) and B ( service consumer) to a system C ( service financier ) , then also A (service provider ) is in balance with C ( service financier ) . The state quantity , which is coincident within these systems is the temperature ( the higher the temperature of a body , the larger is the average speed rate of its particles )

• First law of thermodynamics : The energy of a closed system (human, health systems ) remains unchanged. Various forms of energy can therefore interconvert , but energy can neither be created out of nothing , nor can it be destroyed. No system does work without supplying any other form of energy and / or without reducing its internal energy.

• Second law of thermodynamics : heat can not pass by itself from a lower body temperature ( lower rate of speed of its particles ) to a body of higher temperature ( higher speed rate of its particles). For example, heat can not pass by itself from  service providers to more and more demanding service consumers. Or: heat can not pass by itself from service consumers to increasingly demanding service financier ( insurances ). The inflation spiral and cranking the economy needs energy.

• Third law of thermodynamics : it is not possible to cool a system to the temperature of absolute zero. A person , or a health care system can not  be cooled to absolute zero . ( its particle velocity magnitude is zero )

• From all that follows that one-sided money exploitation and profit maximation of the health systems through the financial industry while ignoring the laws of thermodynamics leads to overheating and burning out of people, to non-renewable yield of the energy content and reserves of the systems and to the eventual collapse of the health systems.