Doctors play an important role in improving US healthcare woes

Elisabeth Rosenthal, a reporter with the New York Times, is doing American doctors a favor. Her series, Paying Till it Hurts, is forcing us to face our role in the US healthcare problem. That’s a good thing, because, as it goes in the practice of Medicine, the first step to achieving good outcomes is identifying the problems. Ms. Rosenthal’s most recent piece, Patients’ Costs Skyrocket; Specialists’ Incomes Soar, published today on the front page of the Sunday Times, aimed its scalpel on the lucrative specialty of Dermatology. But one mustn’t focus too much on the skin, there are ample areas of healthcare in need of debridement. It’s always best to start with matters of agreement: The United States of America has a problem with healthcare. Americans pay too much and get too little. Our difficulty in fixing the healthcare mess sheds light on another recent cultural phenomenon: as a people, Americans seem to have lost their gumption. Rather than confront the obvious and embrace common sense, we line up like sheeples and accept faux solutions like the Affordable Care Act. In that way, there is blame to share. For me, this complacency is depressing. For such a competitive lot, the American people, including, yes, doctors, should be ashamed when we look at how our outcomes and costs compare on a worldwide scale. How do doctors fit into the healthcare equation? We can’t fix everything; but we can help–or at least we can stop making it worse. — ...
Source: Dr John M - Category: Cardiology Authors: Source Type: blogs