Monday, July 31, 20063
On the proposed Medicare redistribution of reimbursement
It's scaring the hell out of the medical-device industry:
'Industry and surgeons have to face up to reality: We have been overpaying for procedures - in particular, cardiac procedures,' Durenberger said. 'We have to do something to change it.'
Comments
-
Gasman
It's rationing at it's most basic. More of our care is going to be decided by politicians playing to the greatest number of votes. In the end it might not be bad because people who vote need to be alive and reasonably robust. For politicians to desire to create more such people might just be a non-perverse incentive.
-
Anonymous
If we move to a socialized system we are going to have to ration costs in a major way, and one of the best ways to do that is slash reimbursement to the superspecialist docs.
-
Anonymous
No surprises here. Unless we develop more cost efficient ways to treat our patients, ultimately our care becomes unaffordable to the masses. This is a purely economic matter. How much less expensive medical care must have been been when we had to rely on physical diagnosis rather than imaging, an apothecary to compound our poltices, and death came swiftly for the majority afflicted by disease.
Post a Comment6:13 PM
Canadian primary care docs make about 85% of what US docs make, which isnt too bad, considering that Canadian specialists make at most 40% of what the average US specialist gets.
In other countries, the gap between primary care and specialist money is much much narrower than it is in the States.
Here in the USA, specialists easily earn triple or quadruple what a primary care doc gets.
When we switch to socialized medicine, you can kiss that income gap goodbye.
The fact is, for all of our fancy technology and super subspecialists, our morbidity/mortality rates are WORSE than other nations, meaning that all our fancy technology does very little overall good to lifespan.
11:39 PM
11:03 PM