Powerful Forces Afoot
Today, powerful and unprecedented forces are driving the U.S. health care system. These undeniable demographic, economic and technological forces have put enormous pressure on the way medicine has been practiced over the last 50 years and have disrupted traditional...
ER Patients Often Left Confused
In the New York Times today, Laurie Tarkan reports on a new study published in the Annals of Emergency Medicine. Here's an excerpt: A vast majority of emergency room patients are discharged without understanding the treatment they received or how to care for...
Paying Doctors to Ignore Patients
This opinion piece appeared recently in the New York Times: Paying Doctors to Ignore Patients By PETER B. BACH Published: July 24, 2008 THE longstanding push-pull between Medicare and Congress has erupted again. Last week, Congress, overriding a presidential veto,...
Seeing Red: The Growing Burden of Medical Bills and Debt
The Commonwealth Fund has published their analysis of the impact of medical bills and accumulated medical debt. Here's their overview of the publication: Analysis of the 2007 Commonwealth Fund Biennial Health Insurance Survey finds the proportion of working-age...
Comparing Hospital Costs in Oregon
The state of Oregon has made available to the public a comparison of the costs of some common health care procedures. Here's the introductory blurb from the Oregon Health Policy and Research web site: Governor Kulongoski has made health care accessibility and...
Small Business is Latest Focus in Health Fight
The New York Times recently reported on the 20 million (out of 47 million) unisured Americans who work for small businesses. Here as excerpt: As the number of people without health insurance continues to rise, many states and Congress have begun to focus on one of the...
The Triple Aim and Key System Elements to Achieve It
System objectives ("The Triple Aim," as developed by by the Institute for Healthcare Improvement) Improve the overall health of the defined population Reduce per-capita cost Improve the individual patient experience in terms of clinical outcome, patient safety and...
Strategy and Actions
I hope you are all enjoying the Oregon summer, now that it has finally arrived. I want to begin by thanking everyone who attended our first annual Archimedes Movement Membership Conference at Lewis and Clark College on June 14th. As you know, our movement is...
BlueCross Rates Soar 26 Percent
Today's Oregonian has a story by Bill Graves about the continued dramatic rise in health insurance premiums. It begins: A 26 percent rate increase by Oregon's largest health insurer underscores the need to overhaul the state's health system and bring costs under...
Most Doctors Are Not Using Electronic Health Records
An article in today's NY Times points out that when it comes to electronic health records we have far to go despite the benefits. Here's an excerpt: A government-sponsored survey of the use of computerized patient records by doctors points to two seemingly...
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