Sorry I have been reeeealllllly inresponsive here since I moved to Creaders last August!!! I'll be checking the comments here more regularly.
Thanks for sharing your thoughts on this issue. I agree that the high costs of health care in this country is a complicated matter and cannot be explained in one article like this. I was simply trying to share my thoughts and limited observations.
Of course medical schools are always hard to get in, what I was referring to was during the economic boom years of early 2000s, compared to other career choices that seem to take shorter time and offer compatible payoff, going to med school became less attractive to young people.
HCC:
Thanks for the data! Do you have some information comparing the payout levels in the US to other countries?
昭君 发表评论于
回复mdgg的评论:
Sorry I have been reeeeaaaallllly inresponsive here since I moved to Creaders!!!
Thanks for your comments! I agree this is a very complicated matter and that's why I was just offering my own observations and it definitely cannot cover all the bases! I understand it is a human nature that when you are sick, you want to do all the possible tests in order to find out what is wrong and what can be done to cure you (I'm sure when I'm the patient, my view will be different), but it cannot be denied that all these technological developments and new tests that might not be always necessary are driving up the costs. It's a balance that's hard to determine.
mdgg 发表评论于
The single most important factor which drives up the health cost is the practice of defensive medicine for fearing of leagal letigations. This is exactly why the payout is declining. A significant portion of exams, hospitalizations, medical equipments, and monitoring are just for this purpose. This is also human nature. Suppose you have a headach that does not go away for a while, you want a head MRI now rather than wait until paralized. Medication is also another big component of health care cost.
It is a very complicated matter and I don't suppose you can lay it out with couple of paragraphs.
I have to disagree with that -- and I think that is a frequent misconception circulated by many. For instance:
Verdicts and Payouts.
-- In 2001, the latest year studied by the U.S. Department of Justice, median awards in medical malpractice cases (jury and bench trials) was $422,000. In jury trials, the median was $431,000.
-- According to Public Citizen’s analysis of National Practitioner Data Bank (NPDB) data, “the annual average payment for a medical malpractice verdict has not exceeded $1 million in real dollars since the beginning of the NPDB. The average payment for a medical malpractice verdict in 1991 was $284,896. In 2005, the average was $461,524. Adjusting for inflation, however, shows that the average is actually declining. The 2005 average adjusted for inflation is only $260,890 — a decline of 8 percent since 1991.”
-- Public Citizen also found that the total number of malpractice payments made on behalf of doctors, including judgments and settlements, declined 15.4 percent from 2001-2005 (from 16,588 in 2001 to 14,033 in 2005) and “the number of payments per 100,000 people in the U.S. also fell since 2001 – from 5.82 to 4.73 – a decline of 18.6 percent. Since 1991, the number of payments per 100,000 people declined more than 10 percent.”
-- According to a Bureau of Justice report that examined medical malpractice insurance claims in seven states between 2000 and 2004, most medical malpractice claims were closed without any compensation provided to those claiming a medical injury.
-- Total Payouts. Total medical malpractice payouts, for injuries and deaths caused by medical negligence in the nation, have recently hovered between $5 billion and $6 billion annually. This is less than half of what Americans pay for dog and cat food each year.
You can see more at:
http://www.centerjd.org/MB_2007medmal.htm