Veterans hospitals are proof that National Health Care works, and so the attacks to take them over
by the republicans who want to privatize them is taking them into investigations to reform them the private way. They can't stand that this model of health care delivery is based on the universal system, and it removes all the administration that causes most of the cost of the private system.
"The secret of its success is the fact that it's a universal, integrated system. Because it covers all veterans, the system doesn't need to employ legions of administrative staff to check patients' coverage and demand payment from their insurance companies. Because it covers all aspects of medical care, it has been able to take the lead in electronic record-keeping and other innovations that reduce costs, ensure effective treatment and help prevent medical errors.
Moreover, the V.H.A., as Phillip Longman put it in The Washington Monthly, ''has nearly a lifetime relationship with its patients.'' As a result, it ''actually has an incentive to invest in prevention and more effective disease management. When it does so, it isn't just saving money for somebody else. It's maximizing its own resources. In short, it can do what the rest of the health care sector can't seem to, which is to pursue quality systematically without threatening its own financial viability.''
Oh, and one more thing: the veterans' health system bargains hard with medical suppliers, and pays far less for drugs than most private insurers.
I don't want to idealize the veterans' system. In fact, there's reason to be concerned about its future: will it be given the resources it needs to cope with the flood of wounded and traumatized veterans from Iraq? But the transformation of the V.H.A. is clearly the most encouraging health policy story of the past decade. So why haven't you heard about it?"
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9D0DE6DD113FF934A15752C0A9609C8B63
http://www.vox.com/2014/5/28/5755672/republicans-want-to-privatize-the-va-heres-the-counterargument
"Most private hospitals can only dream of the futuristic medicine Dr. Divya Shroff practices today. Outside an elderly patient's room, the attending physician gathers her residents around a wireless laptop propped on a mobile cart. Shroff accesses the patient's entire medical history--a stack of paper in most private hospitals. And instead of trekking to the radiology lab to view the latest X-ray, she brings it up on her computer screen. While Shroff is visiting the patient, a resident types in a request for pain medication, then punches the SEND button. Seconds later, the printer in the hospital pharmacy spits out
"
http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1376238,00.html
Wellstone ruled
(34,661 posts)Ronnie the Raygun. This is part of Trickle Down Economics,why not,get the dumb tax payer to give us a cost plus contract. Gee,who woulda thunk? GE and Boeing were working on this back in the Eighties with certain defense contracts.
midnight
(26,624 posts)matt819
(10,749 posts)First, a couple of questions.
How many American veterans are there currently?
How many will there be in coming years?
And how many are currently on the rolls at VA facilities nationwide?
Question 1 and 2: Currently 22 million or so, reducing to under 15 million in the next 30 years. http://www.va.gov/vetdata/docs/quickfacts/Population_slideshow.pdf
Question 3: I don't know. But it's possible that many veterans receive health care independent of the VA, so the totals would be lower than the answers to questions 1 and 2.
So here's the idea. Expand the use of the VA system to non-veterans. Now, this is along the same lines as universal Medicare. Using an already existing system/service that runs pretty well and extending it to include larger numbers of the American population.
Just sayin'.