What’s Jay Parkinson up to now?

May 23, 2008

MDNG with an in-depth profile on the cutting-edge physician.

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{ 5 comments }

1 Anonymous May 23, 2008 at 2:41 pm: he makes me laugh. he says the practice was unsustainable after insisting it was going to be successful?

he has no overhead. oh his overhead is his computer and his iphone. i guess he doesn’t have to pay for a wireless connection or travel expenses to visit people. probably doesn’t have to pay for websites or people to manage them. i guess licensing isn’t considered overhead to him.
he is just starting to get into the business side of collections and getting stiffed etc etc.

the one nice thing for him is that he found ‘a bigger fool’ to fund his experiment. i guess we’ll see whether money can overcome the many obstacles to providing quality care to the people that make up his patient population–uninsured young adults without major medical problems.
2 Anonymous May 23, 2008 at 6:10 pm: How can Parkinson and his unencumbered, freelancing patient-pals live in New York and not be aware that their circumstances have nothing in common with those of the vast majority of the uninsured?

These youngsters are the spawn of the yuppies who stormed lower Manhattan, Park Slope and Hoboken in the early 80s. Their privilege is hardly their fault, but you’d think a little education, if not a misadventure or two on the wrong side of Prospect Park, would have opened their eyes.

To Dr. Jay, our country’s whole population of underhoused, marginally employed, illiterate, addicted, crazy and otherwise disadvantaged human beings represents “significant buying power.” Good God, what is he smoking?

Of course, he’s not alone in his delusion that “shopping” for health care is similar to hopping on his Vespa and cruising over to the showroom to check out the new hybrids. Lots of the people who say that can be forgiven: They’ve never set foot on a med-surg floor or frantically paged a hospice nurse (employed by a publicly traded “healthcare” company and serving 200+ prematurely discharged Medicare patients attached to all manner of tubes and pumps)after hours.

But Jay Parkinson must have had a little experience with the unglamorous side of healthcare. Where did he do that pediatric residency,anyway–Shangri La? Brigadoon????
3 jayparkinsonmd May 23, 2008 at 11:09 pm: Washington University, Penn State, St. Vincent’s in the West Village, Johns Hopkins, Shangri-La, Brigadoon — whatever, it’s all the same.

Being an anoymous lackey to your hospital and the insurance industry’s profits all in the name of “curing Medicare” and “sacrificing yourself” to add another month to the lives of 90 year old Medicare patients with “all manner of tubes and pumps” is the best way to change the system. You’re doing a great job changing the system with your anonymous, do-nothing, ineffective blog criticism.

I could have gone the route of concierge doctor for the nouveau riche and charged everyone $5000 a year for a snake oil “executive physical.” But don’t you think everyone — even the yuppie spawn you hate so much — needs an accessible doctor?

I wish you could see the positives in increasing access for a certain group of people. I wish you could see the fact that innovating within the industry and begging Medicare to adopt obviously more efficient communication technology is a 10 year ordeal marred by government bureaucracy, pilot studies, and federal reimbursement reform. I wish you could see that I’m trying to help healthcare catch up to the other industries that embraced effective communication 15 years ago. Toyota doesn’t need a 10 year pilot study to tell them that email and internet technologies are effective. But anonymouses, you have to start somewhere. There are millions of people without accessible doctors who are willing to pay a very reasonable price for customer service from a doctor who communicates the way the rest of the world communicates. And I’m starting with the consumers who will help us refine processes and technology. I believe this is the most efficient, effective way to initiate change in this broken system. Maybe someday the system I’m creating with Myca will not only help the yuppie spawn you hate so much but also your beloved Medicare patients.

Instead, you feel the need to fight me when we should be banding together as primary care physicians looking out for one another embracing initiatives designed to improve the health of our patients and make our profession more satisfying?
4 A Regular Lurker May 23, 2008 at 11:11 pm: “Instead of measuring quality, they will measure patient satisfaction.”

Isn’t this why doctors are already having problems? Because patients want to be “satisfied” with what they want rather than to have the quality care that they need?

And then the doctor’s pay is going to depend on that?!? Please tell me I read the article wrong…
5 Mike May 26, 2008 at 6:13 pm: Hey Jay, who needes doctors more, the Medicare crowd, or the yuppies? How many of the old folkes read email, or can even CHECK email? You honestly can’t see how your model doesn’t work for the majority of patients? And just because you’re 90, doesnt mean you aren’t entitled to another month.