President Obama hopes so.
But, as Abraham Verghese writes, we can’t be so sure of that. The great cost-cutting hopes proposed by the government, which also include information technology and preventive medicine, all have very little data that show there will be any meaningful cost savings.
Are we focusing on the wrong things for cost control? Instead of making the difficult decisions, which includes revamping the physician payment system, the government is proposing solutions that aren’t likely to work. Cutting costs involves denying unnecessary care to patients, but that will likely meet stiff resistance. Indeed, as I’m sure you’ve read elsewhere, one person’s waste is indeed another’s income.
Also, is comparative effectiveness research just latest fad, akin to the evidence-based medicine movement? Dr. Verghese urges caution:
I worry that “Comparative Effectiveness” or “CE” is going to be the next medical buzz word, just like “Evidence Based Medicine” or “EBM” has been the buzz word for a decade. “Evidence Based Medicine” is a term which makes about as much sense as “Sex-based intercourse”–Were we practicing based on zodiac signs before EBM came along? . . . Soon we’ll have a generation of physicians who are CE experts to bump out the EBM experts.
That’s just brilliant.
Related posts:
- Do doctors already have a source of comparative effectiveness research?
- We need comparative effectiveness research, or, I agree with Paul Krugman for the first time ever
- USA Today op-ed: Will comparative effectiveness research help patients?
- Comparative effectiveness research in Newsweek, and parallels between real-life and NBC’s ‘ER’ in Variety
- Comparative effectiveness is dealt a blow in the UK
- Does preventive medicine save money or cost more in the long run?
- A cost effectiveness institute
{ 4 comments }
“Evidence Based Medicine” is a term which makes about as much sense as “Sex-based intercourse”–Were we practicing based on zodiac signs before EBM came along?
I’m afraid lots of doctors were/are. The conservative, training-based approach doctors apply to solving problems is so pervasive and so well documented it need not be rehashed.
EBM is not a buzzword but a change in the way medicine is done, as revolutionary and important and medicine’s (it is important to note grudging and belated and confrontational) acceptance of the germ theory of contagion.
Comparative effectiveness research (CER) is an essential element of health care reform. See http://mdwhistleblower.blogspot.com/2009/05/comparative-effectiveness-sound-policy.html
The quagmire will be in its operation. Special interests will use all of their power and resources to influence the process and the outcome. Careers and industries hang in the balance and they will not stand idly by.
Forgive me for stating the obvious, but wouldn’t it make more sense to first reform the medical legal system before we worry about such things? I think reducing defensive medicine may cut costs just a bit more than the rest of Obama’s buffoonery. Then again, that’d hurt the trial lawyers, and they’re sacrosanct.
Something that is comparatively effective, evidence-based (or whatever BS you want to call it) that fails to diagnose or treat properly still equals a malpractice suit in this country. I agree with Danimal: med-mal reform needs to come first. This will never happen though because lawyers run our government.
Comments on this entry are closed.