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I’ve known many good doctors during my lifetime, both men and women, who practiced medicine with concern for their patient first and all other matters second, if at all. Unfortunately, medical schools don’t seem to be sending more of those doctors to the public. New medical school courses such as Malpractice Concerns, Insurance Company Permissions and How to Survive Insurance Company Interference with Medical Practices seem to have been added to the curriculum of modern medical degrees. More and more doctors are reluctant to prescribe what they know to be in the best interest of their patient, be it an imaging procedure or a specific prescription drug, without first obtaining permission from the insurance company.
I’m not placing all of the blame on doctors because they are attempting to survive in a jungle not of their creation. However, I do believe that if the American Medical Association (AMA) and other medical associations and organizations would stand firmly and with unity against such interference they would prevail in killing this non-medical interference against their medical practice. After all, how could health insurance companies survive if policy-holders dropped their health insurance because it was no longer accepted by medical doctors? Failure of the health insurance companies to pay a fair and reasonable fee to medical doctors could also be factored into the power of the AMA and others to successfully demand their due compensation. The alternative of the doctors would be to cease delivering medical care to people who were no longer covered by health insurance acceptable to the doctors. This is already in place by some doctors who no longer accept Medicaid because of the absurdly low, or non-existent, payment from the Medicaid program.
It’s difficult to accurately pinpoint when this first became a problem in our country but I think it’s safe to say doctors have been progressively hindered by the aforementioned for at least 25 years. So why have they not taken a unified stand against insurance companies? Maybe they need to self-examine their courage to take such a stand. Maybe the type of person who becomes a medical doctor is just too committed to their medical practice and the treatment of patients to become involved in such untidy matters. In the interim, how many patients aren’t receiving good medical treatment based upon the best available diagnostic procedures instead of the only procedures approved by health insurance companies? How often do we hear about cancer patients who are refused treatment by their health insurance company that would have possibly saved their life? How often have you been denied a diagnostic procedure because your doctor said your health insurance company wouldn’t pay for it?
Obama-Care will compound these problems many times over and for those of you who think otherwise I can only offer my sympathy when you finally realize the truth. Medicare is to be cut $500 billion dollars without reducing the care for those who are covered by Medicare? Medical doctors are being supplemented by Physicians Aides who have less than half the medical school of a medical doctor and this won’t affect the quality of medical care in our country? Will health insurance companies pay less for the services of a Physician Aide than for a fully degreed medical doctor? Oh yes, one more thing, will the AMA and medical doctors stand as a unified group and protest all of these problems until appropriate corrective actions in the best interest of all are implemented?