Over-Utilization (unnecessary and inappropriate care) is the bull in the china shop destroying health care. We must gain control of utilization if we wish to save health care.
Since doctors control care, it is only reasonable to look to them to bring about the necessary change. Trust me they can. If tomorrow every physician were to practice only appropriate care based on clinical findings, we would instantly reduce medical costs by 30 to 40 percent across the board. Why is that not happening? Good question but the answer is absurdly simple. Nobody is asking them to practice lean medical care. Instead, we just pay them less or deny payments.
If we would only reward physicians appropriately for practicing the medicine they were taught in medical school, they would willingly comply. Don’t believe they would? My experience at The Managed Care Alliance in the 1990′s clearly showed that physicians, when compensated fairly and treated with respect, willingly complied with the simple injunction: proscribe no treatment that is not justified by the clinical findings.
The so-called health care gurus’ need to consider the simplest method for reforming health care and give up on all the complicated payment and capitation schemes they so love.
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