Our inequitable, inefficient, oftentimes uncaring health care "system," revealed.
Jeffrey G. Kaplan, M.D., M.S.
Improve Healthcare's Value or It's Not Affordable
The main tension about healthcare centers around medical need, quality, access and cost-efficiency, i.e., affordability.
These factors are critically linked in reality and theory. The Value Equation shows how they relate to each other and to you.
Basically this means you can increase value by raising quality, improving accessibility and by lowering the cost of care. The "cost of care," however, is the elephant in the room.
Doctors are never punished for overdiagnosis
Considerable “havoc may be wrought by untrammeled overtesting” but it is “perceived underdiagnosis that arouses legal and moral wrath."
Severe Headache Responds Better To an OTC Combination That Includes Caffeine
Combination therapies, even over-the-counter like Excedrine Migraine work better than simple analgesics or the combination of two analgesics without caffeine.
Inability to Predict Hospital Readmissions
Current readmission risk prediction models, designed for clinical or comparative purposes, are so weak as to be of little value. Suggestions follow....
Debit Cards and How They Explain the Costs of Care
If you are in a concierge medical practice or you are a specialist, you can stop reading. But, if you aren't and are concerned about the pressure to reduce the costs of care while not compromising accessibility or the quality of care, then understand the incentives matter critically to you; ignore that and you will pay dearly.
Preventing Heart Attacks and Strokes, The “Million Hearts” Initiative
The “Million Hearts” initiative is worth keeping for its reach and cost-benefit. It is designed to "prevent 1 million heart attacks and strokes over the next 5 years by implementing proven, effective, inexpensive interventions."
