I appreciated the “health care” reporting by Myers Reece (July 4 Beacon: “Mixed Reactions to Health Care Ruling”).
As part of the team who facilitated several preliminary public meetings regarding the so-called, “Obamacare” issue, I was privileged to listen to public officials (including U.S Sens. Max Baucus and Jon Tester, and Lt. Gov. John Bohlinger on separate occasions) along with representatives from Montana Hospital Association (MHA), physicians, hospital CEOs and important local officials.
With all that knowledge gathered, the only thing I heard that made real sense to me was a comment about how Americans must “lower their expectations” in order to get health care costs in line or somewhat comparable to what other countries are doing.
I think we need to begin asking ourselves questions like: do we really need our hospitals to pay for expensive marketing programs (upwards of $30,000 a year for membership) like the “Spirit of Women” program (out of Florida) or the “Planetree Model of Patient Centered Care” (out of Connecticut)? These costs for “niche” health care marketing programs are most certainly passed on to the consumer. Do we really need grand entrances to our hospitals and clinics paved with marble, faced with expensive stone, and windows with a view when most patients are rushed out of the hospital in a few days (or less) after most surgeries due to lack of good insurance coverage or Medicare rules?
Reece’s article did well to quote our local hospital authorities. However, I laughed out loud when I read one hospital official’s comment that “…we will continue to provide the same quality of care…” Of course, every hospital CEO, physician, nurse, and ancillary personnel wants to deliver the same level of care, regardless of the new and cumbersome law. But, is that realistic? Especially when the dollars that may have gone to pay for that “patient care” is being diverted to more and more administrative personnel and attorneys who are needed to interpret the new law?
The best thing that’s going on in this valley right now is the Shepherd’s Hand Clinic. The vision of Jay Erickson, MD and his wife Meg Erickson, a Nurse Practitioner, along with people at Christ Lutheran Church has been successfully treating un-insured or under-insured neighbors for more than a decade. This groundbreaking free clinic is a collaborative effort and a win-win situation between loving people, medical professionals, area churches and trained volunteers. I believe the clinic is a model that could be replicated throughout the nation to cut costs (especially in the emergency rooms), and help a lot of people to get the care they need. And, I’ll wager, the clinic doesn’t have a mission statement of 2,700 pages either!
Dr. Erickson, as the assistant dean of the University of Washington’s WWAMI program (which stands for: Washington, Wyoming, Alaska, Montana, Idaho) is doing even more to help health care costs stay down so medical students can get the hands-on experience and training they need (do you have any idea what it costs to obtain an M.D. these days?). WWAMI places qualified third-year medical students in rural health clinics (in the above named states) to learn from seasoned physicians, without the huge expense of training a place like John Hopkins or the Mayo Clinic.
When Michael Moore produced his film revealing the travesty of some of the health care tragedies in our nation, my critical thinking skills kicked in and I asked myself some hard questions: Who’s making all the money? It’s not the doctors any more, or the staff, or even the hospital administrators. It’s our expectations that make the costs so high because, in America, we have been socialized to believe, bigger is better, expensive buildings must mean better care, and entitlement means we can eat or smoke ourselves to death, or live a lifestyle that is sedentary and let our bodies go down the drain, and still we expect the costs of our care should paid for by someone else.
I know these ideas are hard, and I in no way pretend to be an expert. But I am an American citizen and a resident of the Flathead Valley, and I just don’t think this new law will do anything more than confound a system that needs to be revised from within. The health care system in this country is no more “broken” than our governmental system is antiquated, and it is every bit as expensive!
Gina Barker
Kalispell