ISSUE #2 - Ensuring Quality Care for Medicare Patients

With the new health care reform bill, people are trying to make sure that doctors will be paid by quality not quantity. Doctors who treat Medicare patients are going to be seeing a 5 to 10% decrease in their bonuses from the Federal Government. Right now Medicare is set up so that doctors get paid by how many patients they have, not by the quality of their care. In 2006, a “pay-for-performance” bonus was put into place so that doctors could get paid 1.5% more from Medicare. They could get this bonus if they provided information on the type of treatment and details on the quality. Hospitals that use the “pay-for-performance” program had 1,300 less deaths from heart attacks than other hospitals without it. People that support the “pay-for-performance” believe that guidelines help with better communication about the best treatments, and a better quality of work.  The people that don’t support this bonus system think that federal officials don’t have enough knowledge of medicine to decide what is a good treatment and what isn’t. They also say that setting standards for treatment is undermining doctors’ judgment and training.

I think that doctors have the right to a bonus for quality work. Medicare is the reason that they’re salaries will be cut so they should be able to have a way to get that back. The government is getting too involved in what was supposed to be a country of independence. We are getting too reliant on the government. It isn’t their responsibility to make sure that everyone has health insurance. It is the individuals’. Of course I think that all doctors should be doing quality work but that isn’t always true. Those that are doing great work should be rewarded for that. Sam Nussbaum, a chief medical officer says that rewarding quality is a way to keep quality. He also says “We’re at the earliest stage of identifying, recognizing and rewarding quality. Over time, we would want to say a lot more than just, ‘Did a mammogram get done?’” Rewarding quality is the way to get there.      

http://www.leapfroggroup.org/media/file/Leapfrog-Pay_for_Performance_Briefing.pdf

ISSUE #1 -Comprehensive vs. Incremental Health Care Reform

http://kellimontbriand.blogspot.com/2010/11/issue-1-comprehensive-vs-incremental.html

ISSUE #3 -  Safe to Eat?
http://maxineannec.blogspot.com/2010/11/issue-3-safe-to-eat.html