The One Billion Dollar Innovation Reward
A new program called the Health Care Innovation Challenge is being offered by the Center for Medicare and Medicaid and will award up to $1 billion in grants for efforts to improve care and lower costs for patients with public coverage. This could go to physicians and other health professionals, payers, local governments, community-based organizations. This money is coming from the health system reform law that was passed. I guess they found some leprechaun’s bucket of gold because there just seems to be a never-ending amount of money the Obama administration keeps drawing from. Oh, wait a minute, those are my taxes. Anyway, the program really has no hard guidelines that I can tell and they have even said, “If your idea works, come to us. We’ll support that idea.” Okay so here is our chance. What do you think should be done to “improve care and lower costs for patients on public coverage”?
My thoughts so far:
- Define “improve”. This is not so easy. Quality metrics are bogus.
- Pay more to PCPs so that there are more around to even see patients.
- Fire 80% of all administrators in the healthcare system
- Decrease the ridiculous laws and mandates that make it necessary to hire the idiots in #3.
- Pay more for Medicaid visits. More doctors will see Medicaid patients which will lower ER visits, hospitalizations, and total cost in the long run.
What else do you have?
Once again, your politics are showing. This program is not the unique invention of the “Obama administration”. It’s part of the omnibus law passed by CONGRESS, after the GOP refused to surrender partisan goals to the public’s needs. Sure, Obama signed it, but what other choice did he have, if the nation is ever to start caring about the public’s health? Obama has his faults, but he didn’t invent this do-nothing GOP Congress.
Tort reform. If awards are capitated, lawyers will not be able to afford their second house by leeching off of medical mistakes. Fewer lawyers, fewer defensive tests….