10 Reasons Why Nobody should be Worried about Health Care Rationing

Posted on August 13th, 2009 by Jessica

1. The health care system is not nearly organized enough to ration care.  It has taken over a decade, multiple committees, and significant financial incentives and disincentives for items as simple as core measures to take hold nationwide–and these are very simple rules aka ‘never events’
2. There is an art to the practice of medicine [...]

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Filed under: General Medicine, Money Matters

Doing the right thing can be costly.

Posted on July 17th, 2009 by Jessica

There are few decisions in life that are black or white.  Our entire society seems to live in shades of grey.  At some point in every physician’s career one must decide which shade of grey is most comfortable for him or herself.  It is actually impossible to do “the right thing” everyday and with every [...]

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Filed under: Emergency Medicine, General Medicine, Money Matters, Story, story

Why Does the American medical Association (AMA) oppose governmental health insurance?

Posted on June 11th, 2009 by Jessica

The AMA has long oppossed any federal regulation of physician payments and billing.  In fact the medical establishment has rebuked outside regulation and control for over a century.  We are probably the only industry to completely regulate itself on nearly every level.  Maintaining this self-control has been a major priority for the medical industry throughout American hisory. 

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Filed under: General Medicine, Money Matters

Why Does Taco Bell have Better Technology than my Emergency Department?

Posted on August 13th, 2008 by Jessica

Ok, I don’t actually spend a lot of time in Taco Bell, but when a chualupa calls sometimes you just gotta answer. It seems like every business I visit utilizes technology better than hospitals and emergency departments (ED’s). It is a sad day for medicine when every fast food restaurant in the [...]

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Filed under: Emergency Medicine, Money Matters

Physicians Shackled with Debt

Posted on August 9th, 2008 by Jessica

This letter appeared in the July 2008 publication of Emergency Medicine News 30(7): 3, 33 in response to a column written by Dr. Leap
I am a 30-something EP practicing for five years in California. I also spent a couple of years on the East Coast. It really is a jungle out there in the ED [...]

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Filed under: Emergency Medicine, General Medicine, Money Matters