On 19.08.2009, at 16:52, Chris Gehlker wrote: > On Aug 19, 2009, at 5:46 AM, Charles Bennett wrote: > >> What is the motivation of the doctor? He argues that he is >> required >> to take all preventive and rehabilitate measures unless ordered not >> to >> by the patient or person with responsibility. > > He could be right. > My sister trained in California but now runs a hospital in > Washington. I think she told me there is a lot of variation from > state to state in the amount of discretion that medical personnel can > exercise in deciding that any given treatment is inappropriate. > > I have heard way to many horror stories to doubt that there are cases > where physicians perform needless procedures to get paid.
Some good grounds for introducing a system where evidence based principles are used to decide which treatments under which circumstances are paid for by health insurance companies and which are not. For example like they do (or are in the process of implementing) in countries with decent health care systems such as eh... Australia Germany UK etc. ...of course, you need to convince the rabid fringe like eh... >> I don't know that I want the government making those decisions either ...Chuck... ... that its not the government that makes the decisions, but rather: an independent group of specialists assesses applications from groups of medical professionials to get particular treatments for particular conditions under particular circumstances "encoded" for inclusion in the reimbursement system according to evidence from clinical trials that the treatment is efficacious and better, or at least as good as (and no more expensive than) the current gold standard. Its the way forward, unless you think that it makes more sense for patients, or their freinds and families, or their private insurers to have the power to wave money at hospitals, or private practitioners to obtain the treatment that they in their ultra confident naivety are sure is appropriate. mark. _______________________________________________ OSX-Nutters mailing list | [email protected] http://lists.tit-wank.com/mailman/listinfo/osx-nutters List hosted at http://cat5.org/
