Health Care Priorities Survey
A survey of physicians and consumers [I don't like this term at all] found that [p]hysicians and consumers appear divided on their health care priorities for 2005.
For physicians:
Malpractice reform, unsurprisingly, is top priority for physicians. More than 70% identified medical malpractice insurance and lawsuits as the leading factors that drive up costs, followed by the aging population (42%), the cost of prescription drugs (42%), and the poor health habits of Americans (37%).
For consumers [still not liking the term]:
By comparison, 60% of the consumers in the postelection survey said prescription drugs were the main cause of the rise in health care costs. For these respondents, health care and prescription drug costs ranked closely behind the economy and jobs as the number-one domestic priority for Congress.
Interestingly, when their answers were divided according to party affiliation:
...Republican respondents (57%) ranked medical liability reform as the second-highest priority for Congress, whereas Democratic and independent respondents didn't even list it as a top issue.
posted by ema @ 1:55 AM
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I believe I'd rather be a "consumer" (i.e. one who is PAYING for a SERVICE) than a "patient" (i.e. one who is nothing but dumb flesh).
I'm not at all surprized that doctors and human beings with health problems are at odds. Doctors have become businessmen, not healers, and are more concerned with the entrepreneur's worries than the physician's: money, insurance, liability, and ego.
My last two experiences with "traditional" (i.e. allopathic) health care had horrible results: the first of the two left me bereft of any hope of relief and with no offer of help besides a simple "I could prescribe an anti-depressant." (I wasn't depressed.) The next encounter involved my being allowed to bleed profusely for over an hour because the doctor thought I was, well, dumb flesh! *shrug*
The fault lies not in government or lawmaking, but in the human beings involved. Too many people abdicate responsibility for their own health and look blindly for help where they really don't deserve any, and too many doctors have become defensive and businesslike due to the pressures they face in their fields. It's all ego, laziness, and an inability to shoulder our proper responsibilities.
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