News outlets offered a variety of articles about health care use and quality.
The New York Times: A new study finds "that more than half of the 354 million doctor visits made each year for acute medical care, like for fevers, stomachaches and coughs, are not with a patient's primary physician, and that more than a quarter take place in hospital emergency rooms. The authors of the study, which was published Tuesday in the journal Health Affairs, said it highlighted a significant question about the new federal health care law: can access to primary care be maintained, much less improved, when an already inadequate and inefficient system takes on an expected 32 million newly insured customers? ... Examining records of acute care visits from 2001 to 2004, the researchers concluded that ... more than half of acute care visits made by patients without health insurance were to emergency rooms" (Sack, 9/7).
Chicago Tribune: "The new federal health care law is bringing additional demands by insurance companies that doctors and hospitals be held to higher quality standards. While this push by insurers on quality implies that consumers will get better care because doctors and hospitals will be measured against the best performers, there may be an unintended consequence: It could leave patients with fewer choices of medical care providers, depending on which health plans they purchase" (Japsen, 9/4).
The Wall Street Journal reports that a recent survey on employer-provided health care (from the Kaiser Family Foundation and Health Research and Educational Trust) also offered an insight into quality issues. "Just 34% of firms employing at least 200 people and 5% of firms employing between 3 and 199 people reported reviewing performance indicators of plans' clinical and service quality. ... On a conference call with reporters, HRET research director Megan McHugh said that in theory, if more big employers considered quality in their decisions, 'that could create competition and drive quality improvements.' She speculated that firms 'may simply be choosing health plans based on price'" (Hobson, 9/3).
An August RAND Corp. study says retail health clinics can only expand as part of the national health system if federal policy finds a way to encourage more coordination between such clinics and primary care physicians, American Medical News, a publication of the American Medical Association, reports. "The study said more research is needed to determine how retail clinics fit within the health care system. But the study details policy implications to consider, including a change in reimbursement structures to offer incentives for care coordination among retail clinics, physicians and hospitals." The federal health department commissioned the study (Dolan, 9/6).