Fixing the American health care system is simple. Here ’s how to do it.

If we listen to the president, fixing the American health care system is too complicated.  It is not actually that complicated. The number one issue is cost. Even with many millions of people unable to access care, we already spend close to twenty percent of every dollar in the U.S. on health care. If we hope to include everyone in the health care system, then we need to lower health care expenditures dramatically. Here’s just one way we could do that. A 2014 BMC Health Services Research study (“Insurance-related Administrative Costs in United States’ Health Care”) found that billing and insurance-related administrative costs accounted for nearly fifteen percent of health care spending. If you are at all familiar with the American medical billing and payment system, you know that it is exceedingly complicated and wasteful. If you are not familiar with it, here is a description of the incredible amount of work entailed in getting paid for a doctor’s appointment. To put things in perspective, all this work is for a service that, on average, brings in $75. Two things are necessary to generate a medical bill. First is the diagnostic code(s). There are 68,000 codes from which to select. And insurance companies can deny a claim if they feel the code used is incorrect, or if the diagnosis is not covered by a patient’s insurance, or if a host of other confusing rules is not followed to their satisfaction. Continue reading ... Your patients are rating you online: How to ...
Source: Kevin, M.D. - Medical Weblog - Category: General Medicine Authors: Tags: Policy Practice Management Public Health & Washington Watch Source Type: blogs