For decades, we’ve been witnessing a pattern of retrograde evolution in the healthcare system. I recently asked a colleague, Dr. Richard Reece, a retired pathologist and a prolific writer, about the main changes in the healthcare system between now and when he started practicing in 1965. His answer is below. (It’s important to note that [...]
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CNN’s Sunjay Gupta did an interesting story today on a survey conducted by the Physicians Foundation to explore the “reasons for an identified exodus among family doctors and internists, widely known as the backbone of the health industry.” Out of the 12,000 physicians surveyed, almost half said they “would seriously consider getting out of the [...]
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The latest issue of the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM), includes an extensive discussion on the future of primary care, stating that:
The challenges are formidable, for there are so many reasons for young physicians to go into other fields. Many physicians graduate from medical school with staggering debts, and procedure-oriented specialties offer higher potential [...]
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I’ve always believed that physicians are one of the most tech-savvy groups of people. Apart from the historic use of sophisticated diagnostic and procedural devices, physicians have shown their canny use of technology by, for example, being among the first group of professionals to adopt PDAs. Epocrates replaced the bulky Physicians’ Desk Reference almost overnight. [...]
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For years, physicians have been well aware of an evolving healthcare crisis in this country but now a new wave of reporters and academics have started to write with an increasing sense of urgency about the deficits of the system. A recent article in Forbes talks about the potential benefits of disruptive innovations to make [...]
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Obama is on the right track. He has launched a new website to better engage his tech-savvy fans and encourage them to “participate in helping him pass his legislative agenda.” He’s even planning to appoint a chief technology officer and “has said he’ll have a five-day online comment period before signing any nonemergency legislation.”
Let’s hope [...]
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Even if you didn’t vote for Obama, you have to admire him for his leadership and the precision with which he carried out his campaign. As part of a grassroots effort, I had reached out to both presidential candidates regarding their healthcare plans and asked them five important policy questions. Below are Obama’s answers. One [...]
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Today, I received the following email from a concerned citizen:
I just got a letter from my PCP. She is closing her practice at the end of Nov. She cites stringent demands of insurance companies, diminishing reimbursements, and growing operating costs as the reasons. She says that she has had to work harder and harder and [...]
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