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Dr. Lisa Davidson had 8 years of frustration while running a successful traditional practice in Denver, Colorado. She had 6,000 patients when she decided to stop taking insurance and adopt the same business model as Neuhofel. Her patient list has dropped to about 2,000. She used to spend about 15 minutes with each patient and now it's more like 45 minutes. "We're on track to make more money and take better care of our patients," says Davidson. "It's a win-win all around."
Given their recent surge, do these practices pose a threat to equality in healthcare?
Personally, I think it's a fantastic idea and one that will be difficult or impossible to actually ban.
They are moving to make all those that practice medicine or are in the health related field, to be employees of the government.
There's definitely consolidation involved. IIRC, private practices are closing shop and the doctors are being assimilated into large faceless corporate practices, decreasing doctor-to-patient consultation times and making the process appear more like a deli counter than health care.
No, these practices are exactly what health care should be. Pay out of pocket for doctor's visits, medicines, and save insurance for major things like hospitalization, cancer treatments, etc. We are on a high deductible plan, and it's amazing how affordable medical expenses can be when you are an engaged consumer. And we have coverage in case something major happens.
Unfortunately next year our insurance costs are going to go through the roof b/c Obamacare doesn't allow our plan.
There's definitely consolidation involved. IIRC, private practices are closing shop and the doctors are being assimilated into large faceless corporate practices, decreasing doctor-to-patient consultation times and making the process appear more like a deli counter than health care.
The government, in it's barefaced attempt to drive private practices out of existence, is making paperwork so onerous and costly that physicians are driven in to hospital based practice, since paperwork there can be centralized in a more cost-efficient process.
The government, in it's barefaced attempt to drive private practices out of existence, is making paperwork so onerous and costly that physicians are driven in to hospital based practice, since paperwork there can be centralized in a more cost-efficient process.
Don't forget the cheaper rates for malpractice insurance when hired at a conglomerate.
Ironic that we in the computer industry refer to this as moving backwards, or going from distributed computing to a monolithic mainframe architecture.
Given their recent surge, do these practices pose a threat to equality in healthcare?
Personally, I think it's a fantastic idea and one that will be difficult or impossible to actually ban.
A very interesting article and one I shall mull over.
I will note that my great-grandfather was a medical doctor and, of course, accepted either cash or barter (fixing a door, eggs, etc).
As a youth in the early 1960s our family doctor was cash-only. However, he retired in the 1970s after being sued by a patient for not correctly diagnosing some problem (I forget the details). It was in the 1970s that malpractive suits against medical doctors (and hospitals) began skyrocketing.
Which leads me to a general question: do these doctors, like the ones cited in the article, not have liability insurance? It may be well to have only 2,000 patients, but if just one patient decides to sue then the doctor is left exposed to a potentially devasting financial hit.
The issues are, I believe, rather tied together. As malpractice suits against medical doctors rose, medical doctors began having to purchase medical malpractice insurance. When some patients began to collect huge (I mean, huge) verdicts against medical doctors (which the insurance companies were obliged to pay) insurance rates rose. As insurance rates rose, doctors (and hospitals, etc) had to raise their own rates. As they raise their rates, people were eventually priced out and so sought health insurance.
It is a vicious cycle. I wish the article would 'follow up' on the individual doctors named in about five years, and see what their status is.
Given their recent surge, do these practices pose a threat to equality in healthcare?
Personally, I think it's a fantastic idea and one that will be difficult or impossible to actually ban.
What's this got to do with Obamacare? There was no "Obamacare" 8 years ago. It's only been around the past 3, and only parts in effect the last two or so.
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