Getting Back to Primary Care

Learning Module 1- U.S. Healthcare System- Cheryl McGehee

The U.S. healthcare costs are the highest in the world according to one study but, our mortality rate is nothing to get excited about (Bates, 2010).  According to this article, countries that focus more on primary care, afforded to a majority of their population, have much better outcomes. Overall satisfaction with primary care physicians is low in the U. S. and steadily on the decrease (Bates, 2010). This means that we are quickly moving toward a specialist based system rather than primary.  One major reason given for this discrepancy in cost to outcome is the fact that primary care treats the patient as a whole, whereas a patient may have to see many different specialty physicians at once, if plagued with multiple chronic conditions. Another reason is that to be able to practice as a primary physician means doctors must keep up with more and more information, which is constantly changing and sometimes overwhelming, especially in a large, busy practice. These facts also make it unattractive for new medical students to make the decision to go into primary care. Some changes have already started, for instance, the Affordable Care Act has slated the primary payment schedule to increase by 10% (Bates, 2010). This may not be enough incentive to keep or attract new doctors to the field. Primary care could also potentially cut healthcare cost due to omission of duplicate testing and diagnostic procedures, initiated through our current process of multiple specialty physicians necessitating the delivery of their own unique treatments to an individual chronically ill patient (Bates, 2010). Adding to this every growing problem is the fact that the baby boomer generation is causing a shift in number of aging Americans, daily. Overall it would be beneficial for the U.S. to take a hard look at ways to support directing the physician care of our nation back to primary versus specialty care.

References

Bates, D. (2010). Primary care and the us health care system: What needs to change? Journal of General Internal Medicine, 25(10), 998-999. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s11606-010-1464-0

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2955476/

That is absolutely amazing how much money is wasted in the healthcare system.  I agree that the entire world could stand to benefit from us using even a small amount of that money for research, or even lowering medical bills and the rising cost of insurance.  My employer offers medical insurance, but it is almost unaffordable for most of the employees.  I was able to obtain insurance for my wife and son through a private company that sells for all the major insurers for 25% of the employer cost, and has the same if not better benefits.  I also agree that the repeated tests and exams are just silly, one would think that your records should just follow you from office to office.  On the other hand I know that many of the repeats are do to the legal ramifications.  It seems that in the healthcare field every thing we touch causes us more liability and the possibility of getting sued. I believe that the possibility of legal recourse is what causes most of the repeats that we deal with.  For example even though the repeated blood work will go to the exact same lab as the previous one, each physician wants to be able to say he or she did a thorough enough exam to back their diagnoses.  It is kind of a catch 22 and not good for consumers, but something needs to be done about that much waste.  I wish that I had a few answers, but I don't.

US Healthcare

Bianca Zinno

Module 1

US Healthcare System

                This article is about the waste and misuse of funds in the US healthcare system. Thirty cents of every dollar spent in the healthcare system is wasted (Lowry,2012). That comes to a grand total of $750 billion annually (Lowry, 2012).What a large amount of money that is wasted! That amount would cover 150 million workers, the 2008 bailout, or the budget for the Department of Defense (Lowry, 2012).Of this $750 billion, $210 is spent on things that are likely unnecessary, like repeated tests (Lowry, 2012). For example, a lab test that is unnecessary or has been done recently. If a patient had their cholesterol checked, and a month later changes doctors who repeats this test. $130 million is spent on services that could be done cheaper elsewhere, like x-rays done in an ER rather than in a doctor’s office (Lowry, 2012).Going to a minor emergency clinic like CareNow for a broken toe, for example, instead of the ER, would save money.  $75 billion is spent working on healthcare fraud, and $190 billion is spent on paperwork (Lowry, 2012). With all of the recent talk of healthcare reform, the government should also find a way to make sure that the funds spent on healthcare are not wasted like they are in our current healthcare system. Hopefully, something can be done to curb these extraneous costs. Think of the additional research and treatment that could be done on our patients if this money would be put to good use, other than wasting it on things like unnecessary repeat testing and finding better ways to reduce healthcare fraud. People’s lives could be saved because of the additional research and new therapies that could be discovered. Not only that, our personal health insurance costs could go down. Lower premiums would allow for more families to be able to afford insurance.

Works Cited:

Lowry, Annie. (2012, Sept 11).US Healthcare Finds Both Waste and Opportunity to Improve.

 NY Times.. Retrieved from  www.nytimes.com

US Healthcare System

 

Learning Module #1- US Healthcare System-Beverly Braswell
According to a study that was performed in 2013, families spend more money on the cost of health insurance then on the groceries to feed the same families. The report, the 2013 Milliman Medical Index, published by Milliman Inc., looked at the costs of health care for a family of four living in the U.S. (Glynn, 2013). They found that the yearly cost of benefits increased 6.2% to $22,030, compared to $20,728 last year alone. In four of the last five years, the family of four has experienced a greater percentage rise in health care costs than the employer (Glynn, 2013). If the average employee cannot afford groceries and healthcare, they may be left with deciding if welfare would be the better route to take to survive in today’s society. We are just talking about groceries; there are other needs that families must also cover such as utility bills, house payments, car payments, and day care expenses to name a few. The family must somehow figure out how to make less money go further in an inflated society.
In our text the perfect example was used when the authors referred to a lady who need to make more money, but was limited to her current location and a position that would not advance (Liebler & McConnell, 2012). She returned to school and obtained her master’s degree. She went from a part time coding specialist to a full-time director of the health information department. What I learned from this was never look at a situation as impossible, but look beyond your current situation for what might seem impossible to achieve the unlimited possibilities.
References
Glynn, S. (2013, May 23). Health Care Costs More Than Year of Groceries for American Families. Retrieved June 3, 2013, from Medical News Today: http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/260901.php
Liebler, J. G., & McConnell, C. R. (2012). Management Principles for Health Professionals, Sixth Edition. Sudbury: Jones & Bartlett Learning.

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U.S. Healthcare System

This week the blog will feature posts on the U.S. Healthcare System as a whole.

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Health Professions Technology Program
Tarleton State University