The Health Care Blog – Page 737 – Everything you always wanted to know about the Health Care system. But were afraid to ask.

Above the Fold

A Growing Chorus on the RUC

Mar 29, 2011• 4

By BRIAN KLEPPER

Yesterday on Kaiser Health News, Barbara Levy MD, the Chair of the AMA’s Relative Value Scale Update Committee (or RUC), published a glowing defense of the RUC’s activities. Her article extols the work of the 29 physician volunteers who, “at no cost to taxpayers…generously volunteer their time,” “supported by advisers and staff from more than 100 national medical specialty societies and health care professional organizations.” She fails to mention that the physicians’ and organizations’ efforts to craft the RUC’s recommendations have direct financial benefit to the physicians, specialty societies and health care professional organizations whose representatives dominate the RUC proceedings.

She points to the openness and transparency of the RUC’s proceedings, noting that “the general public is able to comment on individual procedures, and processes are in place to ensure that input from all stakeholders is considered by CMS. Finally, the AMA ensures transparency of the process, making the data and rationale for each RUC recommendation publicly available.” This, from an immensely influential Committee that refuses to share the identities of its members except by their societal affiliation, that keeps its proceedings private, and that can not be observed except by an invitation from the Chair. If anything, the RUC’s goings-on have been secretive and opaque. Go into any health care professional audience and ask, as I have, for a show of hands of people who know what the RUC is. It has been virtually unknown except in wonkiest circles.

Dr. Levy also points out that, in Medicare’s budget-neutral environment, hard decisions have to be made, and that in 2006, $4 billion – a little more than one percent of that year’s Medicare allocation – was transferred to primary care. The clear implication is that this came at the expense of specialists. But she conveniently ignores the vast majority of coding valuations that have increased specialty income while strangling primary care. (More comprehensive background on the RUC, including articles by the AMA that describe the RUC’s perspective in detail, may be found here.)

Dr. Levy’s article presumably responded to a growing chorus of recent voices that have detailed the RUC’s disastrous impact on American health care, beginning most recently last October with a Wall Street Journal expose by Anna Mathews and Tom McGinty, and an explanation in the New York Times by Princeton health care economist Uwe Reinhardt. With David Kibbe MD, I wrote about this topic on Kaiser Health News in January, calling on the American Academy of Family Physicians (AAFP) to abandon the RUC. Then Paul Fischer MD joined in with his Family Physician’s Manifesto. All this work built on the foundation of many health care professionals – John Goodson, MD; Robert Berenson, MD; Thomas Bodenheimer, MD; Roy Poses, MD to name a few – who have carefully documented the biases and excesses that have been wrought by the RUC’s shadowy process.Continue reading…

You’re Sick. I’m Not. Too Bad.

Mar 29, 2011• 41

By ELAINE SCHATTNER, MD

There’s a popular, partly true, sometimes useful and very dangerous notion that we can control our health. Maybe even fend off cancer.

I like the idea that we can make smart choices, eat sensible amounts of whole foods and not the wrong foods, exercise, not smoke, maintain balance (whatever that means in 2010) and in doing so, be responsible for our health. Check, plus.

It’s an attractive concept, really, that we can determine our medical circumstances by informed decisions and a vital lifestyle. It appeals to the well — that we’re OK, on the other side, doing something right.

There is order in the world. God exists. etc.

Very appealing. There’s utility in this outlook, besides. To the extent that we can influence our well-being and lessen the likelihood of some diseases, of course we can! and should adjust our lack-of-dieting, drinking, smoking, arms firing, boxing and whatever else damaging it is that we do to ourselves.

I’m all for people adjusting their behavior and knowing they’re accountable for the consequences. And I’m not keen on a victim’s mentality for those who are ill.

So far so good –

Last summer former Whole Foods CEO John Mackey offered an unsympathetic op-ed in The Wall Street Journal on the subject of health care reform. He provides the “correct” i.e. unedited version in the CEO’s blog:

Which Way Transparency Nirvana?

Mar 28, 2011• 4

By MICHAEL PAINTER, MD

First the good news—many are pushing the envelope on public reporting of health care information these days. For instance, last week the HHS/Health 2.0 Developer Challenge awarded honors to a new mobile app—using Hospital Compare data in new and innovative ways—try it. This application maps and provides some quality information as well as immediate ER waiting times for nearby hospitals. The idea of this app challenge, as you know, is to unleash moribund federal information, such as that sitting in the creaky Hospital Compare—to innovative types who will take it and create new—and, ideally, useful ways to present the information. That’s an exciting turn that makes altogether too much sense.

Then Wednesday, I had the good fortune to attend a very thoughtful AHRQ sponsored meeting on public reporting of care information for consumers. The meeting included a good mix of consumers, employers, regional alliance leaders, health professionals, researchers and others. Bill Roper provided the opening keynote. The messages ranged from overt optimism about the important role of public reporting in the drive toward sustainable high value care—to the sober assessment that although public reporting has matured (some)—we may also be reaching limits. As Steve Jencks commented—we’ve made progress—but let’s keep some perspective here—public reporting still needs some quick wins—it “isn’t quite covered in glory, just yet.”

Meredith Rosenthal, in her plenary presentation, observed that public reporting is essentially about to graduate from high school—sitting in the guidance counselor’s office trying to decide whether to go to college or trade school. Bob Galvin, in the closing session, added—that while public reporting is indeed in the guidance counselor’s office—and it clearly has a bright future—it’s a pretty confused student.

The problem? There seems to be near unanimous sentiment—at least in this group—that public reporting of quality and cost information is critically important to drive sustainable health care quality and value. Continue reading…

Radiologist: Commoditize Thyself

Mar 28, 2011• 26

By DAVID E. WILLIAMS

There is little in the health care world as amusing as watching radiologists work themselves into a froth over some real or perceived threat to their profession. Usually the villain is non-radiologists daring to encroach on radiologists’ turf. See, for example, Radiologists pull out the long knives as the radiology community attacks self-referral by non-radiologists. But the latest story (JACR article fires broadside against teleradiology firms) is about radiologists going after one another.

Gentlemen, we have met the enemy, and he is us! I didn’t pay $30 to access the article itself, but instead refer to an extensive summary on AuntMinnie.

David Levin, MD, and co-author Vijay Rao, MD, of Thomas Jefferson University in Philadelphia, make their case that teleradiology outsourcing contributes to the commoditization of radiology, lowered reimbursement, displacement from hospital and outpatient reading contracts, greater encroachment by other specialties, and lowered quality.

Here’s the problem:

Radiologists have been content to live off the fat of the land, working bankers’ hours and outsourcing inconvenient night and weekend duties to teleradiology firms rather than taking call themselves. Even when they’re around, radiologists in general don’t do a good job of serving the physicians who refer to them, staying in their dark rooms and not being proactive or even responsive. As radiology groups are finding, if they demonstrate they’re not crucial to the success of a hospital on nights and weekends, that also makes a pretty good argument for why they’re not necessary during weekdays either. Once hospitals understand the truth they can dispense with the local, intransigent radiology group entirely.

Deciding What Works

Mar 28, 2011• 4

By STEVEN GOLDBERG

Steven Goldberg is probably best known for the controversial “Billions of Drops in Millions of Buckets: Why Philanthropy Doesn’t Advance Social Progress.” In this post he looks at the ways in which success and failure are measured in his field. Healthcare audiences will note many familiar themes. What should we measure? How should we measure it? How much weight should we give the results? And perhaps most importantly: what other questions should we be asking? — John Irvine

Conventional wisdom holds that randomized control trials (RCT) are the “gold standard” of evaluation. In fact, RCTs only make sense under very strict conditions that can rarely be met in the real world. Most of the time, RCTs produce inconclusive results and simply aren’t worth the time and money. As the social sector assumes greater responsibility for improving the lives of many more people, it should focus less on pseudo-scientific “proof” that programs work and focus more on making good programs better.

Now that the Social Innovation Fund (SIF) appears to have survived the “transparency” commotion, the eleven chosen intermediary grantmakers have less than six months to select their portfolios of nonprofit grantees.

As a commendable exercise in “evidence-based” grantmaking, SIF requires the intermediaries to incorporate evaluation into every step of their awards, from the initial competitive solicitations all the way through final payments and renewals. Applicants will be required to explain how their success should be measured and demonstrate their capacity to do so, and awards will be contingent upon the establishment of meaningful performance metrics, the timely collection and reporting of reliable data, and the faithful implementation of sound evaluation protocols.

How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the (EHR) Bomb

Mar 28, 2011• 25

By MARGALIT GUR-ARIE

Remember the fear mongering rhetoric about weapons of mass destruction and all sorts of other bogey men that sometimes led to war death and true destruction and other times to just animosity, hatred and counterproductive waste of time and resources?

This is exactly what we are witnessing today in Health Information Technology (HIT). Granted this is only a sideshow, while the main stage is occupied by the unprecedented Federal push to computerize medicine, but it has a very shrill voice and it seems to be confusing many good people. There are many legitimate questions that need to be asked, many strategies that should be debated, many errors that must be corrected, but the unsubstantiated, dogmatic and repetitive accusations directed towards HIT in general, EHR in particular, and chiefly at technology vendors and their employees, are borderline pathological in nature.

To be clear here, there are many practicing physicians and nurses who are either forced by an employer to use an EHR they dislike, have tried to use an EHR and didn’t enjoy the experience, or are opposed to the EHR concept on principle because the software has no return on investment in their situation, is not “ready for prime time” or is too closely aligned with the goals of the Federal government. These are all valid points of view and should be listened to and considered by policy makers as well as technology builders, and I have to confess that I do agree with much of what these practicing folks write and say, and as I said many times in the past, practicing physicians, i.e. those who see patients every day, are dangerously underrepresented in all HIT policy and technology decisions being made now at a federal level. Unfortunately, the practicing doctors’ message is being obscured and tainted by the “naysayers who predictably and monotonically chant the “HIT is evil” mantra at every opportunity” (quoting the famed HIT blogger, Mr. Histalk). These “self-proclaimed experts” and their incendiary and largely self-serving monologues are making it very easy to dismiss legitimate problems present in HIT policy and technology.Continue reading…

A Patient is Not a Shunt

Mar 28, 2011• 24

By EVAN FALCHUK

Some people may tell you that health care IT will solve many of the quality and cost problems in health care.

I don’t believe them.

I know a 70-year old man named Carlos (not his real name) who was hospitalized following a bout of hydrocephalus. Hydrocephalus is a build-up of fluid in the skull, which affects the brain. Among other things, people with hydrocephalus can be confused, irritable, and nauseous. Carlos had all of these symptoms.

Carlos’ problem was fixable by inserting a special kind of drain in his head called a “shunt.” This kind of shunt is, essentially, a series of catheters that runs from the brain into the abdomen, and which drain the excess fluid. You can’t see it from the outside, so it’s meant to stay inside of you for a very long time.

For a week after Carlos’ shunt was installed, his symptoms completely disappeared. But they soon started to re-emerge. Worried, his family took him to the hospital. Doctors found that his hydrocephalus was back – the shunt wasn’t draining properly. They admitted him to the hospital, and the next day they put in a new shunt. The surgery went well.

Primary Care Workforce Situation: Not Hopeless

Mar 26, 2011• 3

By DAVID E. WILLIAMS

I sometimes observe that the only sector of the economy as messed up as health care is higher education, where the US has some great institutions but where costs are incredibly high and have been rising relentlessly for long periods of time. These two dysfunctional systems intersect in multiple places, one of which is the cost of medical school and its impact on the physician workforce.

One of the reasons the cost of health care is so high in the US is the overemphasis on specialists vs. primary care relative to other advanced countries. That overemphasis is a result of multiple factors, including a reimbursement system that favors procedures and the prestige associated with specialties. But another significant factor is the cost and financing of medical school. Average debt levels for graduating medical students are around $150,000. Combine that with leftover debt from college and it’s easy to get up into the $200,000 range. That’s a big nut to pay off in primary care where typical compensation is $150,000 per year or so.

That large debt level certainly encourages graduating medical students from going into primary care. My guess is it also deters some would-be primary care physicians from going to medical school in the first place.Continue reading…

The Neverending Story

Mar 26, 2011• 38

By STEVE SANDERS

We’re hearing a lot about the use of electronic medical records (EMR) in medicine. The government is all for it—providing financial incentives for those with EMRs and disincentives for those still relying on paper charts to make their way through the world. Most health professionals, especially new physicians in training, simply can’t imagine a world without an EMR at their fingertips.

The ability to electronically capture discrete bits of data on each patient allows us to categorize, tally, and build unbelievably beautiful charts and graphs.

These systems also uncover deficiencies in patient care; with the push of a button, we know whose blood pressure or blood sugar is out of control, or how many patients weigh too much for their height. Clinicians click-through as many templates as possible in order for the system to capture these professional nuggets of information. Nuggets worth their weight in gold to researchers and pharmaceutical companies, eager to market their next blockbuster drug to physicians whose patients just happen to fit their marketing profile.

The trouble is when you’ve seen one template–built patient medical record, you’ve seen them all. These systems do such a great job of capturing discrete bits of data that patients become just that—only discrete bits of data.The essence of who they are, their story, becomes lost in attempts at efficiency.

What interests me about each patient is their story: what’s happening in their life that brings them stress or joy. Are they wanting medication for their cough, or really just needing assurance they don’t have lung cancer. Each visit brings a new chapter, a peeling of the onion allowing me to see the various layers of their personality over time. This is more important than almost any other discrete piece of data we could fit into a template. It takes time and effort to build an electronic medical record that speaks for the patient; time that is often in short supply for busy clinicians.Continue reading…

Life Saving Errors

Mar 26, 2011• 15

By DENNIS GRACE

On March 28, 1979 the Three-Mile Island Unit-2 nuclear power plant experienced a feed system failure which prevented the steam generators from removing heat from the plant. The reactor automatically shutdown but, without the feed system to cool the primary, the pressure in the primary system (the nuclear portion of the plant) began to increase. In order to prevent that pressure from becoming excessive, a relief valve opened. The valve should have re-closed once the pressure dropped by a small amount, but it didn’t. The only indication available in the control room showed the valve in the closed position, but that indication was erroneous, representing only that the signal to close the valve (pressure below a set value) had been sent to the valve. Nothing in the system verified the actual valve position. This stuck-open valve caused the pressure to continue to decrease in the system (and ultimately provided a path for spewing thousands of curies of radioactive material into the atmosphere), but the false shut indication prevented the operators from taking actions to mitigate their severe loss of coolant accident.

The primary relief valve design had a history of sticking. That same valve had been involved in at least nine other minor incidents prior to the TMI incident. Most notably, eighteen months before TMI, a similar incident had occurred in another nuclear plant involving a loss of feed and rising temperatures shutting down the plant. In that incident, the plant was just starting up after a maintenance shutdown, so the power level and temperature of the system were not as dangerously high as at Three-Mile Island.