Health Care problems.
The real problem with our health care system? And the first thing that should be changed?
Read about it here.
(I'm sure, as a primary care doctor, I'm biased towards agreeing with this article, but never have a seen such a succinct description of what is wrong with our health care system. You really should read it.)
An excerpt:
"It's clear that Medicare and all major insurers place far more relative value on fancy procedures like stents, EKGs, skin biopsies, CT scans, and bowel clean-outs than they do on actual face-to-face time with patients. Procedures, they have decreed, require more mental effort and skill than seeing actual people. The implications are obvious. Just visit any hospital: The dermatology, radiology, and cardiology centers that depend on high-volume, relatively quick procedures have gleaming new facilities, while the primary care and psychiatry clinics languish, since they earn their keep from poorly compensated face-to-face time with patients. And, obviously, specialists make more money than primary care doctors. (Even trainees grasp this; recently, only a single graduating internist out of a class of 50 residents at Massachusetts General Hospital planned to become a primary care doctor.).....Over time, the big-money specialists dominating the AMA have demanded more and more "relative value" for their procedures. Medicare has rolled over and complied, which has drained revenue from the little-money workhorses—primary care doctors. More than any peculiarity of American medicine, these procedure-mad incentives have corrupted our health care system."
Read about it here.
(I'm sure, as a primary care doctor, I'm biased towards agreeing with this article, but never have a seen such a succinct description of what is wrong with our health care system. You really should read it.)
An excerpt:
"It's clear that Medicare and all major insurers place far more relative value on fancy procedures like stents, EKGs, skin biopsies, CT scans, and bowel clean-outs than they do on actual face-to-face time with patients. Procedures, they have decreed, require more mental effort and skill than seeing actual people. The implications are obvious. Just visit any hospital: The dermatology, radiology, and cardiology centers that depend on high-volume, relatively quick procedures have gleaming new facilities, while the primary care and psychiatry clinics languish, since they earn their keep from poorly compensated face-to-face time with patients. And, obviously, specialists make more money than primary care doctors. (Even trainees grasp this; recently, only a single graduating internist out of a class of 50 residents at Massachusetts General Hospital planned to become a primary care doctor.).....Over time, the big-money specialists dominating the AMA have demanded more and more "relative value" for their procedures. Medicare has rolled over and complied, which has drained revenue from the little-money workhorses—primary care doctors. More than any peculiarity of American medicine, these procedure-mad incentives have corrupted our health care system."
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