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Will Healthcare Reform Spread The Wealth To Primary Care?

February 3, 2009

         

 

          Yesterday\’s Wall Street Journal Health Blog had a post by Jacob Goldstein on the potential struggle brewing between primary care physicians and specialist physicians over the need to free up more money for primary care –  a widely accepted element of necessary healthcare reform.  Earlier that day, the American College of Physicians called for more federal funding for primary care, not through “budget neutral” adjustments in the Medicare physician fee schedule (i.e., by reducing payments to specialists), but simply by paying more upfront for primary care.  The WSJ Health Blog interpreted the primary care position paper this way:

“Congress could try to pay primary care docs more by cutting Medicare payments to some of the rich specialists.  But the rich specialists would fight that tooth and nail, and nothing would ever get done.”

          Reading this, I couldn\’t help but recall a time in my former life when I heard a newly proposed law firm partnership compensation system described by one of its proponents this way: “It will work well because some partners will make more, and everyone else will make about the same.”  Regrettably, law firm profits are a zero sum game.  There may be enough “stimulus” mania (i.e. printing of money) in Washington these days to save the primary care docs and the specialists from a zero sum fate, but probably not for very long.

          More than two months ago, this primary v. specialist conflict was predicted and thoroughly dissected by Maggie Mahar and Niko Karvounis in The Health Care Blog, where they dubbed it the “Spread the Wealth Controversy.”  In the end, they concluded that money alone would not be the answer to the problem:

“Ultimately, we will probably need to grapple with primary care as a cultural issue within the medical community….in medical schools, students are sometimes looked down upon for choosing to specialize in cognitive care.  Further, research has shown that the medical school curriculum actually drains students of empathy, which may contribute to de-valuing communicative, interpersonal care….The bottom line is that we need to take a multi-faceted approach to the primary care crisis.”

          For a more provacative treatment of the need for systemic reform of primary care, see “Mythology and Healthcare Reform” by Monte Uyemura, M.D., also in The Health Care Blog.  Better yet, just subscribe to The Health Care Blog – its a great read on all matters concerning the health care system.

          I have friends and colleagues on both sides of this primary v. specialist conflict.  Most of them don\’t see it as their conflict at all, and find it unpleasant to talk about.  Unfortunately, it won\’t likely go away.

[Image: “Artwork” with 20 Dollar bills]