Our Broken Healthcare System

November 5, 2012

Let me make one thing perfectly clear.  No matter who wins the election on Tuesday, our healthcare system will continue to be mismanaged by third party insurance administrators, our government, insurers and the masses of people who have insinuated themselves between your doctor and you!

Recently, I posted a thread on a physician website asking docs what they liked about practicing medicine. Their responses were dismal.  They appear to be discouraged, even ravaged, by what goes on in the halls and back offices of their practices.  (They, like me, are happy when they are in the exam room with their patients behind a closed door.)  Not one doc sees a bright future for medicine in our country.  Only one doc stated that he would recommend the profession of medicine to the kids he cares for or his own children.

Why?  Our ability to care for our patients has been and continues to be compromised by administrators whose bottom line is either to cut cost or increase
profits.  Prior authorizations have become the least of our hassle.  Outright
refusals of care by administrators of Medicare, insurers and the like are
increasingly more common.  “Best Practices” will mechanize healthcare and gag even the most brazen of vocal physician.  ACOs will employ physicians
and subjective them to the rules of their bosses.

“Best Practices” as dictated by the Panel of 14, will herd everyone into a model designed for the masses.  Society’s needs will be met at the expense of
individual needs.  A physician who does not practice “Best Practice” medicine will be branded as a bad physician and his license will be in jeopardy.

So, vote for whomever you choose, “Obamacare” and its Panel of 14 or Romney Care and the insurance company overlords.  Frankly, they both scare me!  What you need to know is that a healthy individual will better weather the storm that’s coming than an unhealthy one.  The healthy herd will be left to graze, relatively undisturbed, until aging makes it unhealthy.

The best you can do is spend more time exercising, eating healthy, avoiding excesses and toxins, stress and worry, while working at living a Wellthy life style.  Oh yes, there is one more thing you should do. Start a healthcare account and squirrel away some cash.  You may need to travel out of the country to
find the care you need to save yourself or your loved one!

I fervently hope that this article turns out to represent the ramblings of a paranoid mind. Unfortunately, if that is the case, then my profession is suffering from mass paranoia.

Dr. Segal blogs at www.livewellthy.org