Unbiased Analysis of Today's Healthcare Issues
Michael Jordan. Pele. Sandy Koufax. William Henderson. How do the greatest athletes in the world become so great? Do they have an innate ability or are they simply hard workers? Certainly, it is a combination of both. Nevertheless Anders Ericsson, a psychology professor at Florida State University, claims that talent is over-rated; hard work is…
The concept of the Physician Assistant gained its inspiration from 17th century Europe where feldshers were used in the 17th century Russian Army. In the 1960s, China employed over 1.3 million “barefoot doctors” to improve delivery of health care, especially in rural areas. Not until the mid 1960s did the U.S. begin to use Physician…
According to the Marginal Revolution blog (“Seeing is believing“): Laser eye surgery has the highest patient satisfaction ratings of any surgery, it has been performed more than 3 million times in the past decade, it is new, it is high-tech, it has gotten better over time and… laser eye surgery has fallen in price. In…
Most people intuitively believe that having more nurses on staff at a hospital improves health outcomes. After reading Money Magazine‘s report that an average RN earns approximately $70,000 per year, relying on ‘intuition’ may not be the most appropriate manner to judge a nurse’s cost effectiveness. Do health outcomes really improve to justify this cost?…
Economists typically believe that there is too much regulation in the medical field. Due to problems of asymetric information in determining doctor quality, economists believe there is a role for certification and licensure, but these requirements are currently too strict. For instance, many routine procedures could be preformed by a Nonphysician Clinician (NPC) such as…
The use nonphysician clinicians (NPCs) in the provision of medical care has grown over the years. Although physicians still dominate the medical field, there were over 66,000 Physician Assistants in the United States in 2005. Before Physician Assistants (PAs) and Nurse Practitioners (NPs) were licensed, physicians were the only individuals permitted by law to perform…
It is common knowledge that healthcare institutions such as the government (through Medicare and Medicaid) and HMOs are able to negotiate with hospitals for low prices due to their market power. Most individuals who pay out of pocket for medical services can expect face prices which are 30%-50% higher than those of Medicare patients. A…
The American Medical Association (AMA) is a national physicians organization founded in 1847 by Nathan Smith Davis. While, the AMA exists explicitly to serve the interests of physicians, politicians often seek advice from the AMA when setting health care policy. Conventional wisdom is that the AMA is dedicated to providing the best care for patients. …