Fact Check Friday

Healthcare is near to my heart. As a young man, I was briefly uninsured. At that time, Minnesota Care, a state insurance program funded by Medicaid, kept me from tens of thousands of dollars of medical expense debt.

It frustrates me when I hear the complete lack of nuance in opinions on healthcare. I have some pretty strong opinions, so I'll put them out there before diving into some of the facts:

• Healthcare should be affordable, accessible, and doctors should continue in the Hippocratic Oath's dictum of "First, do no harm."

• Medical school should be subsidized. If students can pass the MCAT, the government, state or otherwise, should pay for their schooling. Instead, we ask medical students to borrow a tremendous amount of money, then pay doctors handsomely when they get out of school. How about treating doctors like the professionals they are? Make them state or local employees, pay them a reasonable salaries, and require them to treat everyone. Unfortunately, money and greed corrupt, and there's too much money at stake for this to happen anytime in the near future.

Here's some facts:

• Instead of doctors acting as public servants, many act like businessmen. Look out for these doctors. You could end up a whole lot worse off after a medical procedure than before. Read, "Making the Cut" on ProPublica. You may be surprised at how bad certain surgeons are at their jobs.

• Or, how about the medications your doctor recommends? Be careful. Read about how doctors made millions of dollars promoting drugs for pharmaceutical companies. ProPublica went so far as to call them out in, "Dollars for Docs: The Top Earners." Many of the doctors declined comment, and those that did not only didn't see a problem with the hundreds of thousands of dollars they made speaking on behalf of drug companies, they believed they were providing a public service.

Here's the issue for me: anytime you're making big money from a company or individual, it's in your best interest to do things that please that company or individual. If a doctor is making big money from a drug company, that doctor's going to want to make the drug company look good.

My bias: doctors should be in the profession for the patients and public health, not to make big money. This goes for all health care providers, administrators, etc. Many, if not most healthcare professionals are in it for the right reasons. Unfortunately, with so much money at stake, those who continue to make huge sums--pharmaceutical companies, ethically questionable doctors, insurers, etc.--will fight to protect the status quo.

So, what to do to fix healthcare? The debate rages. What isn't up for debate is the fact that health care in this country is a mess.

• The Federalist suggests some strategies for "fixing" health care in, "Four Little Steps And One Big Leap To Fix U.S. Health Care." I would beg to differ, however, on the author's assertion that workplace wellness programs don't work (point two). For one thing, that's a pretty broad statement. All workplace wellness programs? Check out the New York Times article, "Do Workplace Wellness Programs Work? Usually Not." What the Times article points out, in contrast to the Federalist Editorial, is that the issues surrounding wellness programs are complex. Part of the problem is a lack or true research as to their effectiveness, and the fact that the programs and the studies they cite to tout their effectiveness are funded by the wellness program industry.

• For an in-depth look at healthcare reform check out, "The Strategy That will Fix Health Care" from the Harvard Business review. There is a summary under the byline if the article is looking like too much to read.

That's all for this week. Don't forget to click on some of the links to check some facts. Thanks to Paul Leckband for letting me share my journalistic and social justice oriented bias on his blog.