Katie Grantham
Government Discussion
Ms. Shen
January 28, 2015
Solution to Waste in Healthcare
Within the healthcare system of the United States, billions of dollars are wasted every year. In order to combat the waste of 750 billion dollars of United States citizen’s money, there must be some sort of reform in the healthcare system. The biggest way to reduce this wastefulness is by making sure all physicians are aware of newer technology that may be more efficient than outdated methods. This means that doctors that have been practicing for several decades would have to go through new classes to become updated on medical technology. In addition, classes to update physicians should be mandatory every year to five years so that the doctors and nurses are kept up to date with technology and new methods. A new report by the Institute of Medicine is “recommending that physicians and other health professionals become part of a “learning” system that uses new clinical support tools and payment models linking performance to patient outcomes, as well as a team approach to care management” (American Medical News). This would make a hospital several times more efficient since this would help settle the ambiguity over where money is going. If the path of money is followed through the entire hospital, it would make it easier to see what is causing the most amount of waste and then be able to cut that spending.
Overall, I don’t think that there is any way to solve the problem of