Government-run health care?

Why does the government have to “run” anything. The problem with healthcare today is that it is “run” by administrators,accountants and insurance companies.They all take their cut and add wasteful layers to healthcare. Anyone doing the research would know that.Do you think insurance companies sell insurance for the god of mankind? That they do it as a charitable mission? Get a grip.
How about doctors and nurses running the system?
Let’s try this:
1.An Independent Medical Commission( possibly under NIH) made up of physicians,nurses and the appropriate healthcare professionals(I guess there will have to be an accountant or two)establish set rates based on real costs for procedures and treatments based on the already existing ICD-9 system.Some might call this rationing, but I don’t see how it can be called that.
2. Set up the costs to be covered incorporating the existing Medicare and Medicaid expenditures at true costs factored on the economy of scale this will produce.Disband Medicare and Medicaid and their attendant bureaucracies.
3. Put a number on this cost as an “insurance” premium, for lack of a better term. Produce this number by dividing the national cost (as insurance companies do when setting up insurance pools) into the number of working citizens in the United States.This amount will be deducted from our pay as is SS and FICA.
4. Have this enormous fund managed by the top fund managers in the country. Reinvest this money in our economy( and the global economy) as insurance companies do now. Pay the fund managers what they are worth in the private sector. Matter of fact, make them be private and not government employees.
5. Use the profits that are now in the pockets of insurance companies to:
A.Pay for indigent care
B.Establish & require a standard electronic medical record (this will save billions of dollars)
C.Fund Physician and Nursing programs to put America back on track professionally.
This can’t work you say?Sure it can,with a single payer system reinvesting in itself we will benefit on a multitude of levels:
1.There will be NO MORE COST SHIFTING.
3. There will be no economic incentive to abandon primary care in favor of specialty practices and procedures.
2.Indigent care( or currently un/underinsured persons) can be redirected to lower cost primary care levels because the physicians will be able to get payed the same to see ALL patients. This should cause a proliferation of family docs.The cost to render care on this level will decrease because without multiple insurers playing games, a physician can decrease the billing efforts and be assured of a certain income based on the real number of patients that are seen.
3. We will see true public health policy based on good science and good medicine. Instead of the current model based on partisan politics and greed.
4. There will be enough money in the system for ALL healthcare workers to be paid fairly and well for their Professional contribution to society.
(sidenote:In my area, county governments are beginning to subsidize housing costs for nurses and teachers because they can not afford to move here on the salary they will be making!And I don’t live in New York City.)
Will this be hard? yes
Can we do it ? yes!
It is time for America to take lead again and get off our collective asses.

Completely Agree 12:12 Its fashionable to rail on specialists. Its not all milk and honey for them either, for example medicare pays the same amount for a total knee that it did 30 years ago.

OK – generalist posting here but:

If there is no financial benefit to specializing, why do it?

If we need specialists (and realistically, we do!), we need to:

A. pay them more than generalists

B. or require specialization and get rid of the generalists all together. This means less doctors for everyone.

I don’t care how much anyone else makes as long as I can make enough to fulfil my needs and wants.

IndieRN needs to get a grip. It is fair and appropriate to discuss how economics influence large groups on average. Increasing compensation will increase the number who enter the field. Acknowleging that fact does not in any way suugest or imply that the realistic person with his/her eyes open is in any way selfish, or in it just for the money.

As for using pseudonyms, you also need to get a grip. One of our pseudonymous colleagues likely lost a malpractice case as a result of his postings under a pseudonym. Or maybe he didn’t… but he removed his blog, his blog was brought up in his cross examination, and his blog is gone. Perhaps the pseudonymous among us wish to be able to opine honestly without fear of retribution.