[quote]DrSkeptix wrote:
dhickey wrote:
DrSkeptix wrote:
dhickey wrote:
http://www.cnsnews.com/public/content/article.aspx?RsrcID=50149
I think this just about sums up the arguement. Gov’t run healthcare (and this is the ultimate goal) will limit choices. Instead of chosing an insurance plan that fits your needs and chosing the best treatments with your doctor, treatment decisions will be made by bureaucrats. They will have to make up for the incredible waste somewhere. Let’s hope it’s not on a treatment or medication you need. At least Obama can can afford to pay in cash.
I would hope so, too, dh, but here is why I doubt that expenses drop with “efficiency.”
You will note that rationing does not necessarily lead to increased “efficiency:” some patients will be denied appropriate care nevertheless.
And conversely, restricting expenses to more “indicated” cases means that some will be denied care that they need, as well.
Inefficiency is the price of access.
I didn’t want to sign-in, so couldn’t access the link. I don’t beleive inefficeincy is the price of access. Unless you define access as anyone being able to get any treatment without regard for cost. You want it, you find a way to pay for it. Don’t force me to pay for it and don’t effectivly force me to join your plan that pays for it.
Gov’t regulation has created the third party payer market. They have already effectively limited our choices in insurance, which has driven up costs to the point that they effectively limit our care without third-party payer insurance that cost an arm and a leg. I would define this as limiting access to affordable heathcare with inefficeincy.
I will quote a passage from the article, and you may see the point it makes: rationing does not lead to more efficient use of health care resources. Further, the observation has nothing to do with third party insurance (in the sense you intend) since it is a study undertaken in England under the NHS.
"For instance, the use of coronary artery bypass graft (CABG) surgery in the 1980s in the Trent region of the United Kingdom was, on a population basis, one-seventh the use rate in southern California, where research had established that a substantial proportion of the procedures were performed for equivocal or inappropriate reasons. In the United Kingdom, where there was a National Health Service, regionalization, a small number of surgeons and cardiologists performing large volumes of procedures, and a use rate that was almost one-seventh that of southern California, one might assume that all CABG surgeries would have been done for medically appropriate reasons. I attended cardiac case conferences in a major academic hospital in the Trent region and observed patients with severe left main coronary artery disease being placed on long waiting lists. However, a medical record review of patients who had undergone CABG surgery revealed that in about half the cases, the surgery was not appropriate. Because these findings were so disquieting, the chief of cardiology at one of the hospitals individually reviewed every patient record and substantiated the findings.
“On a population level, financial or supply constraints can be applied to control use, but some individuals will be harmed and some will benefit. As use rates in a geographic area increase, appropriateness remains about the sameâ??some individuals will be harmed and some will benefit.”
(You may not know this part, but “severe left main coronary artery disease”–the so-called “widowmaker lesion”–is an indication in the US for immediate surgical intervention, since the risk of sudden death is so high. It would be malpractice for a patient to be placed on a waiting list, a practice held common under the NHS.)
Now, take the attitude expressed by Mr. Obama in my first post from the LA Times, and couple it with the inefficiency and error rate of rationing under restrictive review (the NHS), and understand that access will be limited, and the medical product will not be of greater quality.
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got it. agreed.