A Doctor Leaving Solo Rural Practice by Marsha McKay DO

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I am one of the docs who decided that medicine is not fun anymore, and more importantly is no longer tolerable with all the documentation, coding, referrals, prior authorizations, begging insurance companies to “let me” prescribe necessary medications and so forth. I can’t practice medicine anymore as an Authentic Doctor so I closed my private solo rural practice five days ago and will now just work 8 hours a week in small county jails. I am tired of spending my days clicking templates on an EMR so that if I get audited I don’t have to go bankrupt paying back Medicare or being accused of fraud when I just forgot to document that someone has a gun in their house or doesn’t wear their seatbelt. I did the EMR incentive program for a year, got my $14,000 and then realized it was a loser financially and time wise and added nothing to good patient care. Ditched the program the next year. Then it was time to cope with ICD 10, ACO’s, patient centered medical home, an electronic health record at the local hospital which is completely unusable and adds hours to hospital work. I really loved my patients, my little office and wonderful staff but I am completely exhausted and done with the struggle of trying to be a good doctor when the forces out there seem to be determined to wear me down. So now about 1500 people have to find a new doctor and I will retire from active family practice at the age of 59. Pretty stupid waste of my training and compassion to be done so early. I am also tired of being perceived as the rich greedy doctor who only wants to make money and is the source of all the health care problems in this country. I am anything but that. Life is too short to work so hard, sacrifice being with family and friends and spend all my time servicing the insurance industry. I’m not tired of being a physician, I’m just done with all the unnecessary garbage that comes along with it. I agree that doctors are wimps and in our defense, we are just too busy most of the time to get organized and do something about this mess. Most of us are just trying to do some good in a complicated world. Now I’m going to take care of myself, my family and have a real life. Yahoo!