So I got an email from a student asking for a basic primer on the US Healthcare system. He’s at Northwestern, so I might recommend him Edward FX Hughes as a go to guy. But my two favorite books about health care are The Social Transformation of American Medicine (by Paul Starr) and Demanding Medical Excellence (by Michael Millenson). Neither are exactly beginner material. I was originally quite taken 15 years ago with Joe Califano’s America’s Health Care Revolution, but that’s pretty dated now.

Given that I haven’t written the definitive work myself, and that Jon Cohn hasn’t finished his book yet, what would you suggest as a great introduction? (Yup, this is an open thread…). And are there millions of students just waiting to buy such a book if I write one? (Publishers wishing to send advances, please email me!!)

John Iglehart’s rather soft questioning of Guidant’s CEO in Health Affairs comes under most excellent and accurate fire from Roy Poses over at Health Care Renewal.

A prominent editor of a prominent health policy journal devoted considerable effort to and published considerable pages of an interview with the CEO of a large device manufacturing firm, yet avoided asking skeptical or probing questions about a current problem that raises substantive concerns about the quality of the company’s products, and even bigger concerns about how the company has dealt with quality problems. The interviewer avoided asking any questions about a similar case from a few years ago. This is only one article, but it seems to indicate how deferentially the health services and policy literature may treat leaders of large health care organizations. 

Health Affairs has a delicate balance to tread. It publishes inter sting interviews with CEOs that a more than just puff pieces–and one doesn’t often see those these days.  However, in order to keep corporate CEOs coming to talk to them they can’t attack them directly. But, you would think that in the light of what’s gone on at Guidant recently, there’d be a bit more of an attempt to hold various feet to the fire, and I hope we’ll see more of it in the future.

So after about 15 years of deliberation, the biggest fraud in the history of health care is coming to its zenith. The news is that the jury has reached a verdict in Scrushy trial. Now we’ll see if all that showing up at black churches and sponsoring Christian boy bands was worth it….

My guess is that in the Michael Jackson tradition he walks, but in my book the crook who blames his underlings and then claims that God forgives him is the lowest kind.

Check back soon for the verdict….

And of course he walks. Not guilty on all charges. Every CFO and person who works there said that he was fully in charge of orchestrating the whole fraud, but up to 200 local preachers appeared on Scrushy’s evangelistic radio show on Alabama cable and said he was innocent. So who would you trust.  A bunch of admitted crooks or emissaries from God?

The amusing thing is that he’ll now try to get control back of HealthSouth. Listening to Jim Cramer on CNBC has been quite amusing…Cramer is not too impressed with the wisdom of the Alabama jury.

Now he’s live on TV giving all the thanks for God, thanking all the pastors and ministers, and everyone who helped get him off.  On CNBC the squawkbox wag said "How about a foursome at the Alabama golf club–Scrushy, OJ, Robert Blake and Jacko?".  His other good line was "Lucky the charge wasn’t ‘Poor interviewing of CFOs" as 5 out of 5 managed to put one over on him…"

Could the jury in the Scrushy case be on the verge of deadlock? It certainly sounds that way from this report in today’s Wall Street Journal:

"Jurors in the corporate-fraud
trial of HealthSouth Corp. founder Richard M. Scrushy told the judge
that they "cannot unanimously agree on a verdict" and asked for "an
explanation in layman’s terms."

The handwritten note, delivered to the judge about
halfway into the jury’s fourth day of deliberations, appears to be an
ominous sign for federal prosecutors while giving Mr. Scrushy another
reason for optimism about the outcome of the four-month trial here."

Now, it’s a little early to say anything conclusive about what a mistrial would mean, but that does not exactly sound like good news if you’re one of the people who think Scrushy was involved in the massive accounting fraud at HealthSouth. 

Well the jury is out at the Scrushy Trial. Don’t really want to spend a whole lot of thought about it, but I’m a little intrigued to see if the preaching at the black Churches and the sponsoring of the Christian boy bands can keep poor Richard out of the slammer. I doubt it, but then again I pride myself on being rational! I read somewhere that it’s easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a Medicare fraudster to enter the Kingdom of Heaven.  But what would I know….

I have a lot to say about the Advisory Board, not all of it bad by the way.  But before I do, go read HISTalk Blog on the subject here and then here (scroll down). Back tomorrow (am way crunched today).