Health policy and public health

4,357 articles · Since 2004

Articles, page 103

What does the Trump victory mean for health care?

November 14, 2016Nov 14, 20165

While health care was a hot topic during previous presidential races, not much attention was paid to it in our current one. For the most part, many people think that Obamacare cannot continue as is: It costs too much, only a few insurances are now participating eliminating the market competition and laden with poor coverage with high deductibles. The world watched with bated breath as Donald Trump surprisingly won the …

Health policy

Instead of repealing the Affordable Care Act, strengthen it

Kenneth Lin, MD

November 12, 2016Nov 12, 20169

On the election day that made Donald Trump the next president of the United States, I traveled to Lancaster, Pennsylvania to give a lecture. Long a conservative political stronghold, Lancaster County was dotted with “Make America Great Again” campaign signs, forecasting Trump’s comfortable 47,000 vote margin there, which ended up being more than two-thirds of his 68,000 victory margin in Pennsylvania, one of the states that effectively decided …

Health policy

What does hugging have to do with physician pay?

Peter Ubel, MD

November 8, 2016Nov 8, 2016

According to recent research, a hug a day could keep the doctor away. According to another study, Twitter can predict the chance that people will experience heart attacks. A normal blogger would look at these two findings and tell a story about the relationship between stress and health. I’m not normal. I looked at these two studies and came to a different conclusion — that we …

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Health policy

The broken dreams of Obamacare

Richard Young, MD

November 8, 2016Nov 8, 201610

I have written before about predictions of the actual costs of Obamacare and the probable death spiral of increasing costs and decreasing participants. Several recent reports have brought more clarity to the cost realities. Recently regulators across the country approved…

Recently regulators across the country approved rate hike requests by Obamacare insurance companies even greater than they originally asked for. For example, Pennsylvania regulators approved rate hikes of 33 percent, which was …

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The broken dreams of Obamacare

Health policy

Our health system is in dire straits with no good plans for reform

Linda Girgis, MD

November 7, 2016Nov 7, 20162

In her home country, everything is free. However, there is a catch -- certain services are only available to those who pay for private insurance. Those who are on the “free plan” sometimes must wait months for procedures. My patient…

In her home country, everything is free. However, there is a catch — certain services are only available to those who pay for private insurance. Those who are on the “free plan” sometimes must wait months for procedures. My patient said she knew many people who died on the list waiting for procedures. So, which is better: Free rationed care where people may suffer consequences waiting in line or overpriced care …

Health policy

The government tried to fix primary care and failed. Here’s why.

Peter Ubel, MD

October 25, 2016Oct 25, 20167

Americans spend more per capita on medical care than just about any other country and, yet they often have little to show for it. Americans have worse access to care than people in other countries, and are often less likely to receive primary care services, like preventive therapies and screening tests. Determined to address these problems, Medicare leaders have been testing out new models of primary care, hoping to find …

Physician voices

Medical speculation of Trump and Clinton leaves this doctor aghast

Linda Girgis, MD

October 25, 2016Oct 25, 20166

As with most everyone else, I am watching the presidential race with something akin to amusement and horror alike. And as with many people, I feel that the U.S., as a nation, failed to find a suitable candidate for this presidential election. While there does need to be some test for fitness for office, I remain aghast at the medical speculations and facts being leaked about the presidential candidates. Reading this …

Health policy

Did Obama break the law to save the Affordable Care Act?

Kevin R. Campbell, MD

October 20, 2016Oct 20, 201613

Recently, a federal audit found that the Obama administration has illegally redirected funds related to collections from the Affordable Care Act that, by law, should have been deposited in the U.S. Treasury. President Obama, under the guise of executive order, used these tax dollars to bail out insurance companies that have experienced hundreds of millions of dollars in losses due to their participation the Affordable Care Act (ACA) exchanges.

In their …

Physician voices

Bullying isn’t just for kids. Do you do it?

Edwin Leap, MD

October 19, 2016Oct 19, 20165

I well remember being bullied on the school bus. On many cold, wet mornings (a large portion of the year in West Virginia, by the way), I found my junior-high self sitting in front of high school juniors and seniors who turned their class rings upside down, then used them to hit lesser life forms on the top of the head in a whipping motion. Turning around in pain and …

Physician voices

Donald Trump triggers deep-seated human instincts

Anonymous

October 19, 2016Oct 19, 20163

My dad is a locally famed and sincere career politician. All my life I have seen him value public service over personal wealth. As a young lawyer, he worked in Washington DC for the Department of Justice during the civil rights movement, and he often shares stories of his tour of duty in 1960’s Alabama. After that service, he came back to West Virginia where he has been elected to …

Health policy

This election is focusing on the wrong health issues

Miranda Yaver, PhD

October 19, 2016Oct 19, 201611

For all the media’s (and candidates’) attention to candidate health over the course of this presidential campaign, we seem to be spending precious little time in the presidential debates discussing the candidates’ actual health plans. Those on the left have…

Those on the left have “diagnosed” Mr. Trump as unhinged and mentally unstable, calling attention to a narcissistic personality consistent with a DSM diagnosis, though in violation of the “Goldwater Rule.” They have further raised the …

Health policy

Health care: The big issue Trump and Clinton choose to ignore

Manoj Jain, MD, MPH

October 17, 2016Oct 17, 201629

For me, the saddest part of the 2016 presidential election is not that we have two of the most disliked presidential candidates in history but that so little attention is being paid to health care. You may have noticed that…

For me, the saddest part of the 2016 presidential election is not that we have two of the most disliked presidential candidates in history but that so little attention is being paid to health care.

You may have noticed that health care rarely comes up in campaign speeches or in debates, and when it does it’s often scripted empty promises. Donald Trump has a plan entitled “Healthcare Reform to Make America …

Health policy

Why do so many Americans hate their health care system?

Peter Ubel, MD

October 13, 2016Oct 13, 20165

There is lots to love about American health care. We have some of the best clinicians in the world, as evidenced by the huge number of people who come to the U.S. from other countries when they are sick. Yet the American people are less satisfied with their health care system than are citizens of the majority of other developed countries.

Why do people in the land of the Mayo Clinic …

Health policy

We are all responsible for behavior change

John Corsino, DPT

October 4, 2016Oct 4, 20163

Helping our patients make better health decisions can be a challenge. Whether we aim to get them out of bed in the hospital or off of the couch at home, factors contributing to follow-through may be complicated, and the best…

As providers, we would hope that a long and healthy life would serve as the most powerful incentive for behavior change, but …

Health policy

The Affordable Care Act presents challenges for college students

Aldebra Schroll, MD

October 1, 2016Oct 1, 20166

The school year is back in session, and our student health center is busy. As a college health doctor, I have been able to watch the rollout of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) among this population. Since its passage, more…

Young adults have historically demonstrated high rates of un-insurance. An estimated 30 percent of those 19 …

Health policy

What’s wrong with socialized medicine, and what we can learn from the NHS

Janice Boughton, MD

September 26, 2016Sep 26, 201638

The British National Health Service (NHS) was born in 1948, based on legislation passed that year mandating free high-quality health care for all paid by taxes. In contrast, the U.S. started Medicare in 1966 to provide health care to the elderly and the State Children’s Insurance Program (SCHIP) in 1993 to fund health care for children whose parents were unable to afford it. Health care in the UK is still …

Physician voices

This version of health care is purely a business

Jeff Kane, MD

September 23, 2016Sep 23, 20162

Many of us harbor an archaic view of what health care is, so let me offer a little history. During the past century, it's changed from Healthcare 1.0 to 2.0, and now it's Healthcare 3.0. In the early twentieth century,…

Many of us harbor an archaic view of what health care is, so let me offer a little history. During the past century, it’s changed from Healthcare 1.0 to 2.0, and now it’s Healthcare 3.0.

In the early twentieth century, Healthcare 1.0 was a service, though it amounted more to personal contact than effective medicine. At best, medications and procedures were hit-and-miss, so doctors relied heavily on their relationship with their …

Health policy

Somewhere between the extremes: The ideal health system for America

Suneel Dhand, MD

July 7, 2016Jul 7, 20166

This is my 12th year as a physician in the United States. I was born in London, grew up in Berkshire, and decided to become a doctor when I was a teenager. I remember being asked what I thought about the National Health Service (or NHS, the UK’s government-run health system) during my medical school interview. That question is almost a rite of passage for anyone applying to medical school in …

Health policy

What this medical student learned from doing a rotation in Thailand

Taylor J. Christensen, MD

June 13, 2016Jun 13, 20167

As an American medical student doing an elective in Thailand, I was initially troubled when I saw how Thai patients were treated. I'm not speaking of the way Thai physicians apply medical science, mind you -- they rely on UpToDate…

As an American medical student doing an elective in Thailand, I was initially troubled when I saw how Thai patients were treated. I’m not speaking of the way Thai physicians apply medical science, mind you — they rely on UpToDate and sundry U.S. guidelines just as we do — but that was mostly where the similarities ended.

Morning rounds with the team of residents (sans attending, but apparently there was one …

Health policy

This is why health care is not a system

Margalit Gur-Arie

May 29, 2016May 29, 201676

The Merriam-Webster dictionary has many definitions for the term system, but the most straightforward, and arguably the most applicable to our health care conversation is “a regularly interacting or interdependent group of items forming a unified whole.” The common wisdom is that our health care system is broken, and hence, our government is vigorously attempting to fix it for us through legislation, reformation, and transformation. We usually work ourselves into …

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This is why health care is not a system

Health policy and public health

Articles, page 103

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