In both theory and in a practical sense, it is possible that taking a proactive approach of placing greater emphasis on preventive medicine could work. It isn’t going to work the way the Dems are going at it. Setting aside their rather foolish move to put health insurance coverage over health care provision, the approach the left is taking is a nanny-statist, dictatorial, “boot on the throat”, “you do it our way or we’ll tax and regulate you into submission” kind of approach, which is accomplishing nothing more than setting up people’s backs and reducing both liberty and freedom. They aren’t getting “buy in” from the general public on this, so the chances that it will succeed are slim to none.

Conservatives talk about wanting to reduce the costs associated with entitlement programs. That includes both Medicare and Medicaid. Is it worth enough to us to succeed in this that we are willing to look at preventive medicine as a viable option and take more responsibilities upon ourselves when it comes to general health and diet? Would we be willing to take on a proactive role on this, with the goal to reduce costs? Are we willing to take on a leadership role in something like this?

Granted, we’d have to have the support of the people we elect to Congress to keep costs limited if we make a commitment on this type of action. And their commitment on money could be questionable at best.

But would it be worth it to us? What do y’all think?

The federal government has known since the 1970s that we were trending downward on PCPs. We had a spurt during the 1980s that led them to think HMOs might resolve the problem, but by the 1990s HMOs were starting to fizzle out.

The BBA of 1997 capped the number of residency positions to about 100,000K per year. Even now, there’s only about 110,000K. We have 1100 teaching hospitals in the US which isn’t enough to meet the demand for new PCPs along with specialty doctors.

Even under the new business model of integrated health care orgs, there will only be limited spots for PCPs, primarily because of the reimbursement ratio between primary care versus specialty care.

In addition to what I’ve listed, PTTP, a rather significant number of our PCPs are age 55 and older, which means a lot of them are nearing retirement age.

All things considered, O-care basically takes the approach of turning PCPs into the “pack mules” of the health care industry. I can’t see that as being a means of encouragement to med students to go into this area of the field, can you?

Did you mean they can make

“that potential doctors can make 3.1 to 3.5 million across the years of their career by going into a specialty field rather than primary care.”

Did you mean they can make “an average of more than” 3.1 to 3.5 million across the years……..?

Just wondering.

O-care is designed on the premise that by promoting preventive care measures, we can reduce chronic illness, which is one of the primary health care cost expenses.

This preventive care was to be provided by primary care physicians (PCPs). Even prior to O-care, we were facing an impending shortage of PCPs (60K by 2020). Under O-care, this increases the shortage to 90K by 2020 and also increases the risk of losing what PCPs we do have in the career field due to compliance costs with regulatory measures coupled with reduction in reimbursement rates.

There are a couple of token efforts to address the PCP shortage in O-care, but none of them get to the underlying problem that has led to the shortage, i.e. that potential doctors can make 3.1 to 3.5 million across the years of their career by going into a specialty field rather than primary care.

Everything in Obamacare hinges on the success of this preventive medicine approach. The only way Obamacare could even remotely begin to be self-supporting long-term is if preventive medicine succeeds.

But rather than make the investment into PCPs that would allow for that success, the Dems went after their massive power grab to take complete and total control of the health insurance industry so that they could achieve their long-desired goal of single payer.

In this situation that our country is facing right now, guaranteed access to health insurance coverage doesn’t even remotely equate to guaranteed access to health care services, jeffwtux. On that part, the message that Dems have been utilizing is as misleading as it comes.

The US federal government is one of the most inefficient organizations in our country. You can hate capitalism is you want to, but at the present time, the basic focus on efficiency and cost-effectiveness that is a hallmark trade of private sector capitalistic endeavors is very badly needed in order for us to have any chance whatsoever to turn this situation around.

It was akin to putting a target on ones own back at a shooting contest.