A Physician's vision of Healthcare in America

In February of this year Pediatric Neurosurgeon Dr. Benjamin Carson gave a speech at the National Prayer Breakfast in front of President Obama and Vice-President Biden. His speech ranged from quoting scripture, telling of his impoverished upbringing, education, taxation and healthcare in America.

With this blog the ‘Health Policy Institute’ I am constantly looking to find different healthcare leaders who are talking about Healthcare Policy and how they feel it should be improved and how these improvements should be accomplished.

Dr. Carson is one such person. He understands how important healthcare is, saying ‘It’s the most important thing a person can have. Money mean nothing, titles mean nothing when you don’t have your health. But we have to figure out efficient ways to do it.’ He continues stating, ‘we spend a lot of money on healthcare, twice as much per capita as anyone else in the World, and yet not very efficient.’

Dr. Carson then briefly lays out what he sees as the most effective way to handle healthcare in America. ‘Here's my solution: When a person is born, give him a birth certificate, an electronic medical record, and a health savings account to which money can be contributed -- pretax -- from the time you're born 'til the time you die. When you die, you can pass it on to your family members, so that when you're 85 years old and you got six diseases, you're not trying to spend up everything. You're happy to pass it on and there's nobody talking about death panels.

Number one. And also, for the people who were indigent who don't have any money we can make contributions to their HSA each month because we already have this huge pot of money. Instead of sending it to some bureaucracy, let's put it in their HSAs. Now they have some control over their own health care.

And what do you think they are going to do they’re going to learn very quickly how to be responsible. When Mr. Jones gets that diabetic foot ulcer he’s not going to the emergency room and blowing a big chunk of it. He’s going to the clinic and he learns that very quickly. Gets the same treatment- in the emergency room they send him out, in the clinic they say now let’s get your diabetes under control, so you’re not back here in three weeks with another problem. That’s how we begin to solve these types of problems. It’s much more complex than that and I don’t have time to go into that all but we can do all these things because we are smart people.’

I think it is important to look at any and all solutions to improve the healthcare system in America. And while working together on these healthcare policies we can improve the nation and the people of this nation’s health and strength.

(The full speech has been posted on this blog.)

Tell the Health Policy Institute what you think?

Do you agree with Dr. Carson’s idea of a Health Savings Account? Do you think a HAS would cause people to live a healthier lifestyle? Would you rather keep the system we have currently?

Thank you to Baylor University Healthcare MBA for advising its students to see problems as a potential opportunity to become creative.

Sources:

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2013/02/07/dr_benjamin_carson_addresses_national_prayer_breakfast_criticizes_obamacare.html

Healthcare in Politics

HEALTHCARE IN POLITICS

With the election five days away, it is hard to get away from the political banter. While this blog is not of a political but a healthcare nature it seems this election has a lot to do with two visions of America’s healthcare. I want this post to be a side by side comparison of what the current Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) allows currently and what Presidential hopeful Mitt Romney has planned for his healthcare plan; and see if there are many differences.

MITT ROMNEY HEALTHCARE PLAN

o   STATE HEALTHCARE PLANS:

 ‘Give each state the power to craft a health care reform plan that is best for its own citizens.’

o   FEDERAL GOVERNTMENT ROLE:

‘The federal government’s role will be to help markets work by creating a level playing field for competition.’

o   BLOCK GRANT PAYMENTS:

‘Block Grant Medicaid and other payments to states.’

o   PREVENT DISCRIMINATION:

‘Prevent discrimination against individuals with pre-existing conditions who maintain continuous coverage.’

o   LIMIT FEDERAL REGULATION:

‘Limit federal standards and requirements of private insurance and Medicaid coverage.’

o   CONSUMER CHOICE CHANGES:

‘Purchase insurance across state lines’

‘Promote alternatives for “fees for service”’

‘Encourage “consumer reports”- types ratings of alternative insurance plans’

BARACK OBAMA : Affordable Care Act

o   FEDERAL REGULATIONS:

STATE FLEXIBILITY

Federally established regulations, State flexibility in operation and enforcement of insurance exchanges.

o   NEW TAX CREDITS & PURCHASE OF INSURANCE:

Tax credits for families making less than 250k annually; which can help families reduce their premiums and purchase insurance.

o   PREEXSISTING CONDITIONS:

Allow for coverage regardless of pre-existing conditions. Eligibility not based on income.

o   PUBLIC PROGRAM ACCESS:

Extends Medicaid and allows for more access to Medicaid. Additional federal financial participation for CHIP (Children’s Medicaid).

o   REVENUE PROVISIONS:

‘Inclusion cost of employer-sponsored health coverage on W-2 (Sec. 9002).’

‘Imposition of annual fee on medical device manufacturers and importers. (Sec. 9009).

What do you think of the upcoming election’s effect on Healthcare? Is it important to you?

Thank you to Baylor University Healthcare MBA for a great education and willingness to let their students think critically.

Sources:

http://www.healthcare.gov/law/full/index.html

http://www.mittromney.com/issues/health-care

http://www.barackobama.com/health-care?source=primary-nav

http://media1.policymic.com/site/articles/15792/photo.jpg

http://blog.heritage.org/wp-content/uploads/capital_drawing0202108.jpg

Standardization: Makes life Easier and Cheaper perhaps in Healthcare?

The Cheesecake Factory and Healthcare do not seem like an obvious association, in fact they seem like they should never coexist in any type of healthcare comparison. But when author and surgeon Atul Gawande went to dine there with his children he was struck by the Cheesecake Factory’s efficiency, diversification of menu and enormity. Almost immediately he started thinking about how hospitals and healthcare could learn how to run large and diverse hospitals more efficiently if they looked into how the Cheesecake Factory run their successful company. Dr. Gawande looked into all facets of the Cheesecake factory structure. How the food is planned, prepared, made and sent out; all done on a large scale. It was this large scale that caught the attention of Dr. Gawande because at the size of the company they were able to have increased goods, services, variety and quality while decreasing the costs. Dr. Gawande discovered that size was key because of their buying power. A trend Dr. Gawande was seeing in hospitals around the nation, a new type of hospital: a large scale food chain like hospital. Hospitals that were large scale and had a production line type goal to minimize differences in care and standardize the way procedures were completed. The following excerpt from Atul Gawande’s The New Yorker ‘Big Med’ displays how some physicians in healthcare are attempting to standardize procedures where there had previously been no protocol of standardization.  Dr. Gawande met with Dr. John Wright who had caught the vision of standardizing knee replacement surgery.

“Customization should be five per cent, not ninety-five per cent, of what we do,” he told me. A few years ago, he gathered a group of people from every specialty involved—surgery, anesthesia, nursing, physical therapy—to formulate a single default way of doing knee replacements. They examined every detail, arguing their way through their past experiences and whatever evidence they could find. Essentially, they did what Luz (A 'Cheesecake Factory' Manager) considered the obvious thing to do: they studied what the best people were doing, figured out how to standardize it, and then tried to get everyone to follow suit.”

Dr. Gawande himself felt the benefits of this standardization of care when his mother went in to receive a total knee replacement. Her recovery was quick and less painful than her past knee procedures: a standardized procedure that cost the hospital and Dr. Gawande’s mother less money.

Standardization of care can sound callus and impersonal in a field that is filled with working with many different types of people from many different situations. But if standardization can help minimize mistakes and decrease medical costs, and improve the quality of care, it should be looked at more seriously and with more fervor than perhaps expanding expensive technology that only reaches a small percentage and perhaps does little for patient outcome and success.

I have been a fan of Dr. Atul Gawande from the day I read his first book and this article continues to ask the right questions and cause the medical world to look at their system. I encourage others to read his article and get involved in the medical discussion that affects every American. I have expanded my knowledge on healthcare and interest in making it more efficient for all it serves by enrolling in Baylor University’s Healthcare Ph.D.

The New Yorker ‘Big Med’ by Atul Gawande: http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2012/08/13/120813fa_fact_gawande?currentPage=1

The Right to Have Birth Control?

The Obama administration has been caught in a political crossfire as various groups have been extremely vocally in their support or disdain for a recent administrative mandate that: "Would require religiously affiliated nonprofits, including Catholic universities and hospitals, to cover birth control in employee health care plans," according to rollcall.com. However, after the backlash in response to the measure, Obama announced that said groups would be excluded from the mandate.

The existence of the mandate seems to highlight a interesting trend in governance. In essence this mandate regulated moral code. Saying, essentially, that Americans had the right to receiving, at the expense of us all, the means to control birth. Furthermore, why are employers consistently on the hook for instituting governmental mandates? Lastly, will the leaders of tomorrow be equipped with the education to grapple with coming the coming barrage of undoubtedly similar reforms?

Weigh in is you wish...your thoughts are appreciated.