| Health Care |
It is painfully obvious to even casual observers that our nation’s and our state’s health care system is in dire need of reform. We have excellent doctors and facilities, but at the same time hospitals and offices are understaffed and overworked. Costs are also spiraling out of control. It is getting more and more expensive for doctors to treat patients and for patients to be treated. I have a multifaceted plan that will help bring costs back under control and ensure that all Tennesseans have access to affordable quality health care without the need for tax increases.
In order to fix a problem, it is first important to understand the causes that are creating it. You will not hear it from our media or power hungry politicians but government bureaucracy, mandates, regulations, and price controls are driving up health care costs like an unstoppable force. When you talk about government health care it is important to understand that in its current form many different systems are in place. Some examples include Medicare (parts A and B), Medicare DME, TriCare (prime, standard, and life), the VA system, the health department system, and TennCare (Medicaid in most other states). Each one of those networks comes with its own bureaucracy and mountains of regulations and paperwork. For example Medicare and Medicare DME both send out a quarterly CD-ROM full of new rules and revisions to existing mandates. As a health care provider myself, I can attest to the hours of paper work, phone calls, and training it takes for the doctor and staff to stay in compliance with this unbelievably complex, redundant, and constantly growing system. Keep in mind that all the time and money spent on paperwork and compliance training do not in the slightest way improve the quality of health care a patient receives. To the contrary, it just adds tremendously to the cost of seeing patients and draws staff away from patients. It would be far more beneficial for medical providers to spend this extra time with patients or for training in the latest medical techniques. When you factor in the fact that all the different government health systems have their own bureaucracies and set of rules that doctors have to stay in compliance with or face criminal or civil action you can begin to see the unnecessary waste this creates. Each system has its own directors, staff, claims department, and calling center. Sadly, the systems also seem to breed corruption. A great example of our government’s impact on health care is the HIPPA privacy act. Most states had laws to prevent unscrupulous doctors from selling their patient’s information before this issue was “fixed” by the federal government. Congress passed this act stipulating that a patient’s medical information could not be released without consent, mandating how files are stored, specifying where in the office the files should be located, and requiring that patients sign a sheet acknowledging the law. Billions of dollars were spent across the nation so doctors would be HIPPA compliant. Like any business model increase costs are passed on to the consumer, which in this case was the patients. The end result was higher medical costs and more paperwork for the doctor as well as the patient. All that money, time, and trees to solve a problem that was already against the law in Tennessee anyway.
Mountains of senseless regulations and competing bureaucracies are not the only way that the government contributes to a broken health care system. Its crushing business taxes are driving more and more industries to either shut their doors or relocate overseas. As those jobs are lost, the unemployed not only lose their livelihood but also their medical insurance. They understandably often have no choice but to seek government assisted health care. The remaining workers and industries are then shouldered with an ever-increasing tax load and a domino effect ensues. Fixing the economy would put citizens back to work and alleviate the need for so many Tennesseans to be on TennCare.
The government has also decided to negligently not enforce our nation’s immigration laws. Illegal immigrants need health care like everyone else and they often receive government assistance. Our health care system is being strained enough without our taxpayers being taxed to provide medical care for the rest of the world.
Any serious health care fix should also include medical tort reform. A major expense for any health care provider is medical malpractice insurance. The need to protect oneself from liability has become the most important goal of doctors and nurses. Doctors are not able to use their training and expertise to diagnose a medical problem and then run the appropriate tests. Instead, they are forced to run every known test to ensure they cover all the bases. This needless testing is sending medical costs through the roof. When doctors do make mistakes, malpractice trials are incredibly expensive with lawyer fees from both sides running into many thousands of dollars. As the expense of fighting even frivolous suits rise, so do malpractice insurance costs and the overall cost of medical care. An arbitration system would be more efficient, practical, and beneficial to all parties involved. If a patient or a beneficiary feels they or their loved one has received negligent care the case could be heard by a panel of unbiased citizens and medical experts. If the doctor did not mess up it is resolved quickly, if he or she did make a mistake then the victim would receive all their settlement without paying a percentage to their legal counsel. Doctors’ malpractice insurance prices would plummet, overall costs would plummet as doctors stopped ordering unnecessary tests, the court system would be less clogged, and victims would receive all the money that was due to them.
After examining the reasons for rising health care, anyone with common sense can see what needs to be done to fix the system. It does not need more government involvement that is precisely what is killing it now. Government regulations need to be streamlined and bureaucracies reduced. Our government has to create a favorable economic environment that encourages business growth rather than retard it. We should also enforce our immigration laws and replace our medical tort system with an arbitration system. We have a golden opportunity to become a model for good health care for the nation and the world. Taxpayers deserve and should expect their tax dollars to be spent efficiently and in a productive manner. Citizens that need TennCare should not have to be constantly worried about being stricken from the roles because the system is bankrupt. It is time to put partisan rhetoric aside and focus on solutions that allow all Tennesseans to have access to good health care that is affordable and effective.
Brandon Dodds
Back"Mountains of senseless regulations and competing bureaucracies are not the only way that the government contributes to a broken health care system"
Brandon Dodds
"The government solution to a problem is usually as bad as the problem."
Milton Friedman