Welcome to this installment of the Weekly Health Insurance News Roundup. In this issue, we will look at the repercussions on rising health care and insurance costs, how being healthy can save health care costs, and a worrisome lack of primary care physicians. Our first article comes from Minneapolis Star Tribune and is entitled, “Curbing health bills brings different cost.” This article looks at the rising trend in patients forgoing preventive and follow-up care due to high health care costs as well as making decisions for themselves that can go against the opinions of doctors.
According to the article — which focuses on people with high-deductible health insurance plans coupled with health savings accounts — discussed how health care spending is at its lowest in many years, and feels these expensive health insurance plans are part of the problem. Recent reports have shown that customers are cutting back not only on essential health care as well as preventive and unnecessary treatments as well. The article then goes into the idea that giving customers choice as to their own health care options is essentially a bad idea.
With new health insurance plans such as these, customers have demanded more and more information as to the pricing of their health care, helping them become more savvy in making their health care choices based solely on cost alone. This leads many patients to go to a doctor only when someone is really sick, forgo preventive care, skip follow up appointments and more. Customers even skip on medication in order to save money, according to the article. This brings a new wrinkle into the idea of universal insurance and customer choice. Will customers make the right decisions for their own health based on their own well-being, or will price always be the determining factor? It’ll be interesting to see, as more information is gathered and more studies released, what the effect on price and choice will have not only on consumers, but on the health care industry as a whole.
Our next article is entitled, “Wellness ensures savings,” and comes to us from TMCNet.com’s TMCNews. The article discusses how, by living a healthy and active lifestyle, one can save on their health care and health insurance costs as well. According to the article, a recent study states that while health insurance costs are rising for companies, many are introducing wellness programs to help stave off higher costs. According to the article, for ever $1 spent in wellness programs per employee, $3.48 is saved per employee.
The article also suggests that companies should constantly shop around for competitive rates in order to keep prices low. The article also states that more companies are not only offering wellness programs to help their employees stay healthier — thereby lowering health care and health insurance costs — but offering tools for employees to manage their health as well, keeping them active in their own health care. The article’s author seems to think these are all very positive steps toward keeping health costs low, and I would agree. Hopefully more and more employers will institute such programs as their cost-benefits become clearer and more well-known.
Our final article comes to us from Forbes and is entitled, “The Doctor Is Out.” In this article, author Paul Howard looks at the troubling trend of lacking primary care physicians. The article discusses how doctors are becoming less interested in primary care and more so in specialties. The American Medical Association, according to the article, predicts that by 2025, predicts that we will have a shortage of roughly 44,000 primary care physicians in this country.
Why is this important? Primary care physicians, or PCP’s, are the first line of defense in the health care field. Most people seek them out first when a health issue arises, allowing the PCP to either prescribe care or send them to a specialist if needed. Without PCP’s, people usually end up going to emergency rooms for basic health care needs, which burdens the health care system even further. Less and less doctors are becoming PCP’s for several reasons, including the tremendous amount of paperwork, which increases the cost of administration, leading to PCP’s making less than specialists such as orthopedic surgeons.
While some doctors are lessening their patient load, some are increasing them significantly to balance out the administrative costs and keep their practices open. While this might be good in some ways, it means patients get less time and attention then they might otherwise. The article argues that a universal health care system would “inject millions more patients into an already strained system.” This is a troubling thought indeed. The article does have suggestions to help with the problem though, such as increased reimbursements for PCP’s, expanding primary care options for patients, and reform the tax code to reconcile tax treatment between employers and health insurers.
Whatever the solution to this issue, any health care system with a lack of physicians is a troubled one, and one can only hope that steps will be taken to make the practice of primary care more attractive and viable to many medical students looking to become doctors. With that, I’ll conclude this edition of the Weekly Health Insurance News Roundup. Until next time, may you stay healthy and happy.
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Health Insurance Savings, Costs, and Lack of Physicians
Welcome to this installment of the Weekly Health Insurance News Roundup. In this issue, we will look at the repercussions on rising health care and insurance costs, how being healthy can save health care costs, and a worrisome lack of primary care physicians. Our first article comes from Minneapolis Star Tribune and is entitled, “Curbing health bills brings different cost.” This article looks at the rising trend in patients forgoing preventive and follow-up care due to high health care costs as well as making decisions for themselves that can go against the opinions of doctors.
According to the article — which focuses on people with high-deductible health insurance plans coupled with health savings accounts — discussed how health care spending is at its lowest in many years, and feels these expensive health insurance plans are part of the problem. Recent reports have shown that customers are cutting back not only on essential health care as well as preventive and unnecessary treatments as well. The article then goes into the idea that giving customers choice as to their own health care options is essentially a bad idea.
With new health insurance plans such as these, customers have demanded more and more information as to the pricing of their health care, helping them become more savvy in making their health care choices based solely on cost alone. This leads many patients to go to a doctor only when someone is really sick, forgo preventive care, skip follow up appointments and more. Customers even skip on medication in order to save money, according to the article. This brings a new wrinkle into the idea of universal insurance and customer choice. Will customers make the right decisions for their own health based on their own well-being, or will price always be the determining factor? It’ll be interesting to see, as more information is gathered and more studies released, what the effect on price and choice will have not only on consumers, but on the health care industry as a whole.
Our next article is entitled, “Wellness ensures savings,” and comes to us from TMCNet.com’s TMCNews. The article discusses how, by living a healthy and active lifestyle, one can save on their health care and health insurance costs as well. According to the article, a recent study states that while health insurance costs are rising for companies, many are introducing wellness programs to help stave off higher costs. According to the article, for ever $1 spent in wellness programs per employee, $3.48 is saved per employee.
The article also suggests that companies should constantly shop around for competitive rates in order to keep prices low. The article also states that more companies are not only offering wellness programs to help their employees stay healthier — thereby lowering health care and health insurance costs — but offering tools for employees to manage their health as well, keeping them active in their own health care. The article’s author seems to think these are all very positive steps toward keeping health costs low, and I would agree. Hopefully more and more employers will institute such programs as their cost-benefits become clearer and more well-known.
Our final article comes to us from Forbes and is entitled, “The Doctor Is Out.” In this article, author Paul Howard looks at the troubling trend of lacking primary care physicians. The article discusses how doctors are becoming less interested in primary care and more so in specialties. The American Medical Association, according to the article, predicts that by 2025, predicts that we will have a shortage of roughly 44,000 primary care physicians in this country.
Why is this important? Primary care physicians, or PCP’s, are the first line of defense in the health care field. Most people seek them out first when a health issue arises, allowing the PCP to either prescribe care or send them to a specialist if needed. Without PCP’s, people usually end up going to emergency rooms for basic health care needs, which burdens the health care system even further. Less and less doctors are becoming PCP’s for several reasons, including the tremendous amount of paperwork, which increases the cost of administration, leading to PCP’s making less than specialists such as orthopedic surgeons.
While some doctors are lessening their patient load, some are increasing them significantly to balance out the administrative costs and keep their practices open. While this might be good in some ways, it means patients get less time and attention then they might otherwise. The article argues that a universal health care system would “inject millions more patients into an already strained system.” This is a troubling thought indeed. The article does have suggestions to help with the problem though, such as increased reimbursements for PCP’s, expanding primary care options for patients, and reform the tax code to reconcile tax treatment between employers and health insurers.
Whatever the solution to this issue, any health care system with a lack of physicians is a troubled one, and one can only hope that steps will be taken to make the practice of primary care more attractive and viable to many medical students looking to become doctors. With that, I’ll conclude this edition of the Weekly Health Insurance News Roundup. Until next time, may you stay healthy and happy.
Other Health Insurance News Options:
Return to Articles Page.