Saturday, February 12, 2005
Crises
Our hospital's last OBGYN has announced that he's throwing in the towel. Unable to pay for the ever increasing malpractice costs, he has decided to only do GYN and ER coverage. 10 years ago our small hospital (less than 50 beds) had four physicians that delivered, this was not unusual at the time. Over the years, all of the small hospitals around us had stopped delivering babies, we were the last hold-outs.
Now patients will have to commute over 40 miles in order to deliver. The malpractice attorneys love to point out how they are improving care by "weeding-out" the bad physicians. They have just increased the risks for expecting mothers in this area because of the long distance from a delivering hospital. It reminds me of when airlines were forced to make parents purchase separate seating for their children because it slightly increased the child's chances for survival in a crash. However, what it did was force more parents to travel by car because of the increased seating costs, and since car travel is much less safe than air travel, total accidental child deaths increased due to car crashes.
But this is about money, not poorly thought out policy. Large hospitals can stay open because they can absorb the malpractice costs for the physician, and their patient population tend to be paying customers. In the rural areas, most mothers are Medicaid, and Medicaid is a loser for a hospital. They don't pay enough to cover costs. However, most rural hospitals continued to deliver because they knew that if delivery was lost, pediatrics would be next and then adult care. Ultimately all healthcare would be centralized to the large urban areas, just the way the government (and the large hospital Lobby) wanted.
So the poor suffer out of this, like they always do.
I have faith that this will come to light one day, and the rot will be addressed. But how many will have to suffer first?
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Now patients will have to commute over 40 miles in order to deliver. The malpractice attorneys love to point out how they are improving care by "weeding-out" the bad physicians. They have just increased the risks for expecting mothers in this area because of the long distance from a delivering hospital. It reminds me of when airlines were forced to make parents purchase separate seating for their children because it slightly increased the child's chances for survival in a crash. However, what it did was force more parents to travel by car because of the increased seating costs, and since car travel is much less safe than air travel, total accidental child deaths increased due to car crashes.
But this is about money, not poorly thought out policy. Large hospitals can stay open because they can absorb the malpractice costs for the physician, and their patient population tend to be paying customers. In the rural areas, most mothers are Medicaid, and Medicaid is a loser for a hospital. They don't pay enough to cover costs. However, most rural hospitals continued to deliver because they knew that if delivery was lost, pediatrics would be next and then adult care. Ultimately all healthcare would be centralized to the large urban areas, just the way the government (and the large hospital Lobby) wanted.
So the poor suffer out of this, like they always do.
I have faith that this will come to light one day, and the rot will be addressed. But how many will have to suffer first?
# posted by Joe Florida @ 10:05 AM 
