Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Politics : A US National Health Care System? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Road Walker who wrote (7794)	7/26/2009 4:37:03 PM
From: i-node	Respond to of 42652

Sure they do... or "piece work compensation" if you like that better. No, not the same at all. Piece work is when factory workers are cranking out homogeneous parts on an assembly line which requires no particular knowledge or the application of judgment, to a subject that is generally not a complex one. The practice of medicine is not an assembly line. It is a profession that deals with intrinsically complex subjects, where two individuals with the same diagnosis may require different courses of treatment based on the judgment rendered by the professional. As I said, you "get what you pay for". If you compensate anyone solely for doing a specific thing, in this case tests and procedures, you are going to get more tests & procedures. This is the same cynical view that Obama foolishly expressed last week. Even were I to get connected with an unscrupulous physician, today's system of specialty practice greatly mitigates that potential, as the Primary Care physician basically orchestrates care. If my FP doc sends me to gasteroenterologist for a screening colonoscopy I'm not going to just come back with a bowel resection without having a chance to discuss it with MY physician. The system of "checks and balances" on patient care is substantial in this way. As has been pointed out to you, the bigger cost is in the practice of defensive medicine necessitated by the flinging of multi-million dollar lawsuits all over the medical community. Read the article again; there is a reason the smartest hospitals in the country, Mayo and Cleveland, have gone to salary. They are getting better results at a lower cost. I don't know about better results but at a lower cost? You bet. I would suspect Mayo of using "better results" as a justification for "lower cost" long before I would suspect medical professionals are routinely conducting themselves in the way you have suggested. Most physicians don't even KNOW which procedures are profitable for them (one of my business interests deals specifically with the issue of assisting physicians with evaluating the profitability of particular procedures). If you ask an ENT doc which procedure is more profitable for him -- an medium complexity office visit versus performing a tonsillectomy, he probably cannot answer that question. And in fact, the answer depends on many factors including who the patient's insurance is with, potential complicating factors, other procedures ancillary to the office visit, etc. Human nature... people act in their own self interest. Why don't you list about 3-4 of the perceived abuses you're referring to, so I can understand what types of things you're talking about? Because I frankly think you are very confused on this subject.