Inadequate coverage leads to No Kidneys
One doctor described the pressure he gets from his manager at the hospital. He regularly gets performance reviews in which he's told how many billable hours he's delivered as compared with his colleagues. This perverse incentive encourages doctors to perform unneeded tests and do unnecessary procedures, because the hospital gets paid on a fee-for-service basis. Just talking to the patient, diagnosing the problem, and telling the patient how to take care of the condition -- which is often the best thing to do -- are not rewarded. Nor is preventive care.
There were no hecklers or birthers while I was there (I had to leave near the end.) But someone asked: isn't obesity a major cause of illness and high medical costs? The questioner thought that people should be more responsible for their own health. The doctors on the panel agreed but said that we can't just let sick people die. It'd be unethical. Besides, some people have bad genes or accidents.
Should government encourage people to take better care of their health? Sure, said the doctor, but not via punitive measures. Instead, government should use education and soft incentives.
Preventive care too should be part of a public health system. Insurance companies have little interest in preventive care, he said, because they rightly assume that most insured people will move to another job and another insurance company.
Conservatives think government initiatives are "socialist" (horror! horror!). But government does a lot of good. Medicare has much lower overheads, and overseas government-run health care systems have much lower costs and better outcomes. Government is simply more effective, cheaper, and more ethical for many things.
Another doctor told the story of a patient who was on life support for some rare but survivable syndrome. After eight days in the ICU the hospital got a phone call from the insurance company saying that they would no longer cover the treatment because the patient had exceeded the median number of days for that treatment. The physicians pleaded, spoke with a manager, and then asked to speak with the insurance company physician. The hospital doctor named the syndrome, and the insurance company doctor said, "What's that?" The insurance company doctor, who was long retired, was unfamiliar with the disease.
What Insurance Companies Do
Here (http://OurailingHealthcare.com/) is an excellent, professionally produced video that presents the facts in a clear and persuasive manner. I wish commercial TV stations were required to broadcast such public interest videos as a condition for having their broadcast licenses.
Dr Paul Hochfeld, one of the speakers at today's event and the brains behind the video, has written, "What's being proposed by Obama and Congress is basically part Medicare part D revisited. They're going to throw more money at a dysfunctional healthcare system and they're going to use government money to do it and it's not going to solve the problems." In other words, what Obama is calling "the public option" (and what OFA and MoveOn are cheering for) is probably mostly a sellout to the insurance companies, for it funnels even more government to the insurance industry. Already, 60% of health care dollars come from taxes. Yet I'm sure most members of MoveOn and OFA want single payer or at least a stronger public option. Heck, even most Republicans want it, I hear.
Bob Wickline, his wife, and his daughter performed his clever "Mad as Hell" song. You can hear the song here:
https://madashelldoctorstour.com/Mad_As_Theme_Song.html
and you can read some of the lyrics at the start of this interview by Thom Hartmann on the Mad As Hell Doctors.
Fight Inadequate Coverage -- ask me how
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