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How Medicare Is Punishing Hospitals That Care For Poor People

Such a no-brainer: If patients who receive care at Hospital A are more likely to get readmitted to the hospital 10, 20 or 30 days after discharge than patients in Hospital B, then Hospital A must be doing something wrong. Perhaps clinicians at that hospital are less adept at diagnosing and managing patients’ problems. Perhaps…

Inappropriate Medicare Incentives Lead to Unnecessary Subspecialty Procedures

Sometimes people flat out need cameras shoved down into their stomachs.  A long history of reflux disease, for example, could prompt a gastroenterologist to perform an “upper endoscopy”—to run a thin tube down the patient’s throat in order to view their esophagus and stomach and look for signs of serious illness.  Medicare has correctly decided…

Is Medicare Being Too Generous To Rural Healthcare Providers?

  If you live in the rural U.S., you probably face relatively limited access to the wonders of American healthcare.  There won’t be as many physicians per capita offering you their services.  This paucity of healthcare professionals will be especially stark for subspecialty care.  There are not many ENT specialists opening up shops in rural…

The Biggest Government Health Care Spender Since LBJ Was…Ronald Reagan?

Many readers will recognize Ronald Reagan’s famous maxim that: “Government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem.”  Some will even recognize his vehement opposition to Lyndon Johnson’s Medicare proposal, before the program was passed into law: “We are faced with the most evil enemy mankind has known in his long climb…