A Doctor’s Perspective on Healthcare Debate
As a young physician who is also a young libertarian, I get asked more often than I care to count how I feel about the nation’s supposed “debate” on healthcare. And since these inquiries are typically made by patients of mine, I try to answer them honestly…though in the interest of punctuality (not to mention the sort of mind-imploding, paradigm-shifting vortex this overenthusiastic libertarian is liable to open up to a suddenly frightened soon-to-be former patient who learns that his or her friendly family doctor is actually a raging pessimistic antiestablishment loon) I try in earnest to be brief.
It usually goes something like this…
Patient: “So, Doctor Beeley, what do you think about this whole Obamacare thing?”, they might ask nonchalantly.
Me: “Well gee, let me see. In a word? Bad.”
Patient: “Wait. What?”
Me: “Sorry. In a sentence that makes a bit more sense? I firmly believe that any official government takeover of the healthcare industry would be the worst possible solution to repairing the very flawed, albeit infinitely more functional, system we are currently mired in. Which, by the way, is their fault!”
(Liberals have already begun attacking me. Please read and defend if you agree. I wrote this at the request of my friend Chris Littleton who runs the CTP site to express the fact that this doctor is NOT in favor of universal healthcare. It came from the heart.)
Read the rest of the article here:
Thank you
Until Doctors become Lawyers there will be no tort reform
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RON PAUL 2012
Lucas, I could not agree more with Beeley's article.
As a fellow physician and D.O., I know Beeley expresses the thoughts of many doctors.
Some of the comments however, were unnecessarily brutal and could not be more incorrect.
The overwhelming majority of doctors want the government OUT of medicine. They want tort reform, and they want the amount of government-required paperwork reduced, without exception. Patients and physicians do not want government involvement in the critical decision making of anyone's life.
All one needs to do is look at what the 3 years of Romney-care in Massachusetts has done to that state. Long waiting times to see doctors and await procedures and bankruptcy. That medical future is now what is coming to the entire country.
Thank you Lucas for posting the story.
Thanks for reading and understanding!
Glad to hear from a fellow DO!
-Lucas D. Beeley
Another thing that pisses Me
Another thing that pisses Me off Royally is the doctor and the customer have no fucking choice. I bet if enough people did this they could pay their doctor a monthly fee say 100 dollars per family for 3 visits a month. Why wouldn't a family doctor want to do something like that? Oh I forgot they can't because the state steps in and puts a stop to it.. We can't have the customer and patient working out a deal between themselves.
If I was in charge You
If I was in charge You wouldn't like my solution either. I would flood the market with doctors until the patient to doctor ratio became fairer.
The government stepped in a long time ago in to the medical field and removed free market principles. In a natural free market doctors would make a killing. Then over time more and more people would want to make the same amount of money thus seeking out the training necessary. After the prospective students graduate as doctors they would enter the work force competing against older doctors for customers. When they compete they provide different alternatives in price and quality thus eventually driving down costs over the long run...
The government though stepped in a long time ago and said NOPE We have to manage the numbers of doctors and We can't let it get to high because it would lower pay....
So basically they fucked the American people in favor of the HEALTH INSURANCE companies to raise prices...
I might not be a Libertarian for saying this but I would rather see they spend the money on training more doctors. Id rather see them get free tuition if they have to work comparable time in a charity state hospital. Hell they could finance this crap with Marijuana if they wanted to do that... But oh know We can't have that because it would benefit ALL of society instead of a select few.
How do you "flood" the market with doctors?
It takes at least seven years beyond a college education to become a physician. It also costs $150k for 4-years of medical school alone.
Where do you get all of these doctors from? The medical schools are full/maxed-out. If you flood the market with doctors, what is the enticement for them to embark on such a journey, without any carrot at the end?
Flood the market...fairer ratio.
Leaving aside how anyone could decide what a "fairer ratio" is ultimately the result must be health care providers with less training, and experience.
So if you go to such a provider who provides sub-optimal care requiring more visits or more tests and treatment to correct, what is really saved if each visit costs marginally less?
Since there are no private medical schools in the US, the cost of establishing and maintaining new ones would be borne by the taxpayers. With more places available, standards for admission would be lower.
Keep in mind that many primary care mds struggle to make a decent living already, so if more competition did lower the price they could charge, more physicians would leave practice.
Physician pay rates have increased way below inflation
for many years, so the only way they break even is by working longer or spending less time per patient.
Private med schools
drhifive,
I'm not sure if you were referring to the hypothetical future landscape (whereby there would BE no profit/incentive to open new private medical schools under the coming system), but I just wanted to point out that there ARE private medical schools in the US, for those of you who might not be aware. I went to one of them. If you meant the former, you're totally correct in assuming any new schools would necessarily be government-funded and most likely "free" to attend and way easier to gain acceptance, acidemically.
Thanks for your comments. You are also absolutely right about the physician pay decreases.
thanks for pointing that out
To be clear my thought was that even the "private" schools now probably would not exist without government sponsored student loan programs, so in a broad sense they are still government dependent and not actually "private", nor are the affiliated hospitals where clinical rotations take place. As I see it, there has been really almost no such thing as "private" in medicine since the advent of medicaid/medicare two generations ago.
I fear that you are correct about the future, and as you describe it doctors are going to be essentially indentured servants, with the government dictating where and what specialty may be practiced.
Yes. There are paid bloggers.
edit: This should have been a reply to "Nose Dive Indeed" by Lucas Daniel below. I hate it when it does this. If you hit reply to a post when you aren't logged in, the system puts your reply at the top as if it were a reply to the original topic. I forgot this time. Hey Michael, can this be changed?
There are many organizations doing this including companies who are paying people to give favorable reviews of products. In other words, they are paying liars to lie. Some of them consider the number of friends you have online to be more valuable than your resume. This kind of fraud seems to be considered normal and acceptable nowadays. You can get a job online doing this yourself. Try searching "wordpress jobs" and join the multitude of liars if you want.
I wouldn't put it past socialist groups like People For The American Way or Acorn to do this, or even our own government, or George Soros for that matter. The new propaganda is way more subtle and convincing.
Well said, Lucas Daniel.
It is truly scary how many doctors actually think the scheme is a good thing.
I read some of the
I read some of the replies...wow...logical thinking has taken a nose dive...Just since Bill Clinton was president and Hillarys plan didn't go through...
"and the truth shall make you free"
John 8:32
Nose dive indeed
My brother and I were discussing the relative speed and eloquence (even if it's all 100% nonsensical, illogical babbling when you stop and analyze it) of the negative posters on blogs like that. What's amazing to me is that they are everywhere, as if it is their full time job or commitment to debunk or defame anything or anyone attempting to spread the truth. I wonder, are there actual paying jobs to do this sort of thing? It seems ludicrous to me, but at this stage of the crumbling empire nothing like that would surprise me.
Thank you for posting Dr. Beeley's letter.
Most people just don't "get it" yet, but they will.
My pleasure
Especially considering that he is me. (Beeley is my last name, Daniel is my middle name)
I appreciate your support
Lucas Daniel?
I have a question,I feel that part of the problem is that insurance companies don't pay their fair share to the doctors and /or hospitals.They are real good at calling you to see if you will negotiate the bill and try and pay only 25%,and then ask you to write off the balance.So then physicians such as your self must double the rates to even get 50% of what it is worth to mechanic on the Human body.Do you agree that this is part of the problem?What are your thoughts?
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This is precisely the problem, yes
You have hit the nail on the head, ATruepatriot.
Not that that phenomenon is the root of the problem - it's actually another symptom - but it is probably the most glaring symptom of the broken market. Because government intervention has forced the market toward essentially necessary 3rd party payers (insurance companies) who need only reimburse a certain percentage (depending upon even MORE laws) to the physicians or hospitals who do the billing (and these rates of reimbursement are falling exponentially), the higher the billed fee becomes in an attempt by practitioners to be "fairly" compensated when the share actually collected is only a tiny portion of that. Thus, even FURTHER driving the industry toward 3rd party payers because out-of-pocket payers (i.e. the uninsured) aren't afforded the luxury of paying only a tiny percentage of their bill the way powerful insurance companies do. They naturally could never afford these ridiculously inflated prices, so they suffer needlessly. The blame, of course, is foolishly/strategically placed on the "greedy" medical practitioners and physicians who are only out to become millionaires and screw over the public. None of that is true in reality. Most doctors are far from wealthy these days, and you will see this reflected in the dearth of physicians who will be trained to accept this new system for even less compensation. The need will be immense in a few years for doctors to treat all these government-insured patients. The healthcare may become "free," but there simply will not be any to receieve.
Thank you for the explanation of this
I see the circle you speak of,This whole thing came clear to me a few years back when I was sent the billing that was to go to the physician by mistake and saw what they were doing.I had to call and ask how this works and they were nice enough to share trade secrets with me.I then asked myself "If I were a doctor how would I feel".I then became aware of the circle that is also crippling to the self paying customers.
Thank you for your time and I would like to discuss this more with you at a later time,I have to go to work,have a good day.
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