Rui Costa e Sousa Read Do Not Harm from Henry Marsh.

How true and it is an American And Europea problem

Jeff Witt Ah, the unintended consequences of socialized medicine !

Joe McMenamin On darker days, I question whether these consequences are indeed unintended.

Will CMS's shift to pay-for-performance based reimbursement help? It doesn't seem like the article acknowledges this much. Over the next few years we will see the greatest shift in Medicare reimbursement (MACRO program) since the introduction of the program in the 60's. It's already begun in the orthopedic space (joint replacement surgery). The fee-for-service model will soon be dead, which should shift some of the focus back to a patient-centric value model.

Luis Chavarria It is difficult not to agree the general principle and point of this article, the regulation of medical practice has possibly hindered and in some cases as the article states forcing doctors to sacrifice their independent professional medical judgment, and their integrity. It also talks about the future of medicine, but if we are to talk about the future we must not forget the past with names like John R. Brinkley, William Baily, Bernard Jensen, Walter Freeman and many others. It would be difficult to “code” what they did and it has not stopped to date around the world. As someone who spent many years investigating incidents at hospitals and clinics, sometimes the drugs and devices were not the problem. Regardless of how compelling the story is, there is always another side.

Luis Chavarria It is difficult t not to agree the general principle and point of this article. The regulation of medical practice has possibly hindered and in some cases as the article states, forcing doctors to sacrifice their independent professional medical judgment, and their integrity. It also talks about the future of medicine, but if we are to talk about the future we must not forget the past with names like John R. Brinkley, William Baily, Bernard Jensen, Walter Freeman and many others. It would be difficult to “code” what they did. As someone who spent many years investigating incidents at hospitals and clinics, sometimes the drugs and devices were not the problem.

Doctors and Nurses have systematically been pushed out of the process of running health care and allowed, almost subliminally, bureaucrats and procurement people to run health care on a cost basis with little regard to the quality of equipment used and outcomes.

Muhammad Afzal Agreed

As a 'patient consumer', I am acutely aware of the amount of money I pay each year for insurance: $7000.00 . That entitles me to pay more money should I get sick. The same process greets me when I (rarely) go to the doctor: get weighed, height measured, blood pressure taken, and then asked if I smoke, how much I drink each week and if I am being abused at home. If I ask a question based on something I read online I am given the 'eye-roll'. Healthcare already feels like an assembly line to me.

Healthcare is evolving, as are we. I look forward to the day when costs are clearly displayed and service providers are accountable for the level of service they provide because we have free choice as to how we take care of our bodies. I am not at the mercy of healthcare. I am a consumer with choices, including doing everything I can to remain healthy on my own and seek alternate solutions to maintaining great health. Thank you for posting this article.

“Let them discover the kind of doctors that their system will now produce. Let them discover, in their operating rooms and hospital wards, that it is not safe to place their lives in the hands of a man whose life they have throttled. It is not safe, if he is the sort of man who resents it—and still less safe, if he is the sort who doesn’t.”

...from Atlas Shrugged

Daniel Davis Government run, fingers in, laws passed, money skimmed, doctors throttled, Union infected healthcare........we reap what we sow

B.M Luklinski Rubbish all,GP-s are idiots....surgery is INEFECETIVE deception

Rui Costa e Sousa Yes, agree.

Definitely worth a read. Australia runs close behind.

Doctors and medical staff in general need the peace of mind and freedom to perform their jobs in the best interest of the patient, without having to worry about government interference. The government is not the expert of healthcare, that distinction belongs to the medical community!

Nicole Baldridge As someone who works for the "regulators" I feel that the system is flawed and many times patients go untreated or poorly treated because of the bureaucratic mess that has been created with all the so called improvements.

Robert Christensen As an oral and Maxillofacial surgeon for some 63 years, I have more than seen the harm caused by our government. When I had also served as a Navy surgeon in the Korean War and a medical corpsman in WWII, I started my private surgery practice. I invented the earliest implants to replace the degenerating or missing TMJ, plus the first three dental implants in the world, yet the FDA sought to destroy me and my two medical device companies.

Joe McMenamin Kudos to Dr. Singer for his clear-eyed assessment. I am old enough to remember pre-Medicare medicine. We did not have these problems in those days. That's not a coincidence.

Jeff McGovern It is a thoughtful and well written article. The government is not the only factor influencing these changes. The food industry has contributed to massive numbers of people with diet related maladies. Opening our healthcare system to all citizens contributes to huge numbers at the ER. Since 1970 the U.S. population has increased by 50%, 203M to 308M. I remember the days of Blue Cross and Blue Sheild. They were the only game in town. They paid by "reasonable cost" for healthcare. For most of 25 years, from the end of WWII, the U.S. economy churned out goods and services that they were able to sell because the other major industrial powers were rebuilding their factories and economies. It was unrealistic to think that scenario would go on indefinately. The reason I say this is because our economy was creating jobs and wealth. Our middle class was growing and healthcare was benefitting along with everything and everyone else. Physicians were the top of the healthcare foodchain.

Michael Abrams It's not just government that's ruined medicine; it's greed. Managed care was a reasonable idea, but (pure) for-profit managed care was absurd. By definition, any savings that resulted from better management of the available resources would go to shareholders and executives… and back to politicians in the way of lobbying (bribery) dollars. There were no incentives to reinvest in education, research, and patient outcomes. Unfortunately, it's the patients that suffer the most.
"There are only two jobs in medicine - taking care of the patient, or taking care of those that do" (Beauchamp)

Antonin Cuc I am a expert on Cybernetics so as a co-author of harmonised EU/CZ technican Law for Medical Devices - implants, in context the Directive 93/42/EEC Medical Devices, orthopadic implants. Just I am needless heavy injured a dying orthopadic patient after bad hip implanting set THA - B.Braun Germany Bicontact S, noncemented, with "fausse route stem".. There are perfect defined the duties of Orthopaeds, Radiologists for safety usage product with "CE" marking by the instruct user´s product information from the producer - there are absurd to ignore "Hard sequential processing of defined partial technician medical activites with defined technical Qualities and technical tolerances for mandstory preliminary individual Planning, realisation, radiologic controlling, in time defined Crashes, reopartion immediately....Despite there were absency individual Plan by the my hips, casual Crash...all culprits doctors so as forensic doctors coding O.K.,but it´s illegal technical implant workflow!

"The nine most terrifying words in the English language are: 'I'm from the government and I'm here to help.'" The Gipper