What do patients want in a physician and how do people select their doctors? These are questions that prompt different answers from different people. Answers likely vary depending on the type of health insurance those responding have. The following is from a Health Services Research study that is now 20 years old. It found that consumers were somewhat passive in their choice of physicians.
Category: Doctors & Hospitals
This Case Study Should be Required Reading in Every Health Econ Course
Man is diagnosed with throat cancer. Doctors at MD Anderson want to treat it with proton therapy at a cost of $96,862.95. The health insurer objects, saying that treatment should begin with less expensive radiation therapy. The doctors say that radiation therapy has a risk of damaging other organs.
In this case, the patient is a trial attorney with means. He pays the hospital for the proton therapy with his own funds and then sues the insurer.
Should Hospital Employed Physicians Steer Patients to High-Priced Hospital Labs?
Hospitals are price gougers to be avoided at all costs, especially if you don’t need to be in a hospital. A good rule of thumb is to never get services performed at a hospital unless you are too sick to go anywhere else.
Thursday Links
- The Pilgrims’ real Thanksgiving lesson
- Was the original Thanksgiving a celebration of the massacre of Indians? No. That’s woke propaganda.
- How to get 8 countries to cooperate on cancer drug research: Start the project before telling any of the regulators.
- Bidenflation: Employer health insurance costs are up 7%; Obamacare exchange plans are up 6%.
- Why are those who supported the Covid lockdowns trying to suppress research showing that the lockdowns didn’t work?
- CDC: Last year’s flu shot was less than 50 percent effective for children and adolescents.