Pennsylvania could save on health care by working with physicians

Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell's (D) proposal to expand health care coverage in the state "goes further" than plans offered by "most politicians," but it does not "target the underlying causes of high cost," including "unnecessary care, financial paperwork, excess prices and fraud," Alan Sager and Deborah Socolar, directors of the Health Reform Program at Boston University's School of Public Health, write in a Harrisburg Patriot-News opinion piece.

Health care costs in Pennsylvania "can be contained only in partnership with doctors because their decisions essentially control almost 90% of personal health spending," according to Sager and Socolar.

"A clinical, financial, legal and political peace treaty with doctors would contain costs by cutting waste and redirecting savings to affordably finance comprehensive care for all," Sager and Socolar write.

They recommend that the state eliminate medical malpractice litigation and "devise trustworthy and fair payment arrangements that free doctors from burdensome financial paperwork."

Sager and Socolar write, "In return, doctors must agree to spend money carefully, weed out unnecessary care and ensure that all patients receive the care they need."

The $110 billion the state currently spends on health care could be divided into two budgets, one to cover physicians' incomes and another to "cover medications, tests, hospital care and long-term care that doctors authorize," they add.

Physicians would have to efficiently spend the money, only withholding care from one patient if the funds could "finance more valuable care for another patient," according to Sager and Socolar (Sager/Socolar, Harrisburg Patriot-News, 2/25).