The following article clearly expresses what we have been espousing for months: without focus on care delivery reform costs will go up,regulation will increase, and innovation at the level of care provision will be stymied.
Dr. Flier explains what is really happening in Massachusetts which is that costs are rapidly rising to the point that the state's payment commission has decreed a new payment model must be implemented now and that it most likely will be some form of capitation. This in itself is not necessarily bad or wrong but the speed at which it must be implemented due to the cost crisis does not allow for thoughtful and careful pilots to understand what would work best.
These new payment models cannot be implemented at a federal level.Massachusetts will have a hard enough time achieving consensus but getting the whole nation to consensus is impossible? It's time for our legislators to step back and take a hard look at what they are about to do. A new insurance mandate for all without the necessary reform of the payment process or the care delivery system will only add a trillion dollars of cost over the next 10 years.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB20001424052748704431804574539581994054014.html
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