The Associated Press (yes, that Associated Press) has reviewed hundreds of pages* of studies and quizzed dozens of specialists to arrive at this finding.
Overtreatment means someone could have fared as well or better with a lesser test or therapy, or maybe even none at all. Avoiding it is less about knowing when to say no, than knowing when to say, “Wait, doc, I need more information!”
The Associated Press combed hundreds of pages of studies and quizzed dozens of specialists to examine the nation’s most overused practices. Medical groups are starting to get the message. Efforts are under way to help doctors ratchet back avoidable care and help patients take an unbiased look at the pros and cons of different options before choosing one. (emphasis added)
And then there is this odd quote in the story:
“This is not, I repeat not, rationing,” said Dr. Steven Weinberger of the American College of Physicians, which this summer begins publishing recommendations on overused tests, starting with low back pain (emphasis added)
Why bring up rationing after studying hundreds of pages from various studies and quizzing dozens of specialists?
On a related note, Obama’s nominee to head the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), Donald Berwick, is a fan of health care rationing.
Berwick has attracted controversy as a strong supporter of single payer health care, particularly in an essay written with two colleagues and published in Health Affairs in 2008.
“With some risk, we note that the simplest way to establish many of these environmental conditions is a single-payer system,” Berwick and his colleagues wrote.
And in a 2009 interview on Comparative Effectiveness Research in Biotechnology Healthcare, Berwick focused on what he perceives as the benefits of the UK’s National Institute for Clinical Health and Excellence (NICE).
“NICE is extremely effective and a conscientious, valuable, and—importantly—knowledge-building system [which has] developed very good and very disciplined, scientifically grounded, policy-connected models for the evaluation of medical treatments from which we ought to learn,” Berwick said.
The interviewer pointed out, “Critics of CER have said that it will lead to the rationing of health care.”
Berwick responded, “We can make a sensible social decision and say, ‘Well, at this point, to have access to a particular additional benefit [new drug or treatment] is so expensive that our taxpayers have better use for those funds.’ The decision is not whether or not we will ration care—the decision is whether we will ration with our eyes open.” (emphasis added)
Sounds a lot like this quote from Obama:
* The AP will review hundreds of pages of studies and quiz dozens of specialists to support the idea that less health care is better. But, they didn’t bother to review the thousand pages of the health care law to understand what was in it.
