Data from the Dartmouth Atlas show patients with chronic illness in their last two years of life account for about 32 percent of total Medicare spending, with much of that expense going toward physician and hospital fees associated with repeated hospitalizations.Opportunities to reduce medical expenditures during the last 2 years of life are often looked upon as a way to reduce the cost of healthcare while actually improving the ...
Mark Novotny, MD
The benefits of successful patient self-management programs
The emerging literature on chronic disease management suggests that successful programs rely on patient self management skills. Having been in the primary care role for 20 years, that initially seemed self evident and a bit “so what?” to me, thinking it meant that we just need to teach our patients a bit more in the primary care office.However self-management skills refer to specific curricula of skills ...
