The Crisis
As 2006 moves into its second quarter, many physicians are facing the worst year of their professional careers and patients will begin facing increased problems with access to care.
Patients are demanding better, quicker and more efficient services; they expect state of the art equipment and the latest technology in diagnostics. Insurance companies and government regulations continually add more burden and red tape to our offices. It takes longer for approvals, prior authorizations, and over-rides on everything we order for what we believe is in the best interest of our patients. Malpractice premiums have increased 10% or more every year for the past several years and other office expenses continually increase.
This all occurs while reimbursements from Medicare, Medicaid and the insurance companies fail to even keep up with inflation, let alone increased costs. Our employees expect their yearly raises, bonuses, and cost of living adjustments as well as their fringe benefits. The bottom line is that physicians are becoming increasingly frustrated and are left with little options. The financial burdens are causing physicians to cease practicing and many will change what they will and will not do.
Many physicians are looking at ownership in other healthcare entities or other investment businesses to survive. Some local physicians are working second jobs at Urgent Care and other facilities to make ends meet.
For your information, the Salary in 2004 for Humana’s CEO was $723,115 with a bonus of $1,247,373 and stock options totaling $24,133,460. The UnitedHealth Care’s CEO, in 2004, made $2,176,973 with a bonus of $5,550,000. He has cashed out $114,552,832 in stock options over previous years and has another $139,598,622 in stock options available.
This occurred while they paid physicians less than Medicare rates for most of our services.
Physicians cannot negotiate fees as a group and cannot discuss options of whether to collectively terminate contracts with providers because of legal issues. This places us at an unfair advantage and continually ties our hands. In addition, insurance companies will not provide us with a complete fee schedule to base our decisions. They only give us a few codes on common procedures. Some of the billing issues were discussed in last weeks postings. There are numerous other problems related to the medical billing system and the insurance industry.
As the current situation and healthcare environment progresses in this manner, more physicians will be limiting what they do and who they serve. It is now at a crisis and things will need to change.
Physicians have met with Sodrel and had meeting with Cochran this morning, but because of personal reasons, he has rescheduled. Connie Sipes is working with us on future dates as well to meet.
Patients are demanding better, quicker and more efficient services; they expect state of the art equipment and the latest technology in diagnostics. Insurance companies and government regulations continually add more burden and red tape to our offices. It takes longer for approvals, prior authorizations, and over-rides on everything we order for what we believe is in the best interest of our patients. Malpractice premiums have increased 10% or more every year for the past several years and other office expenses continually increase.
This all occurs while reimbursements from Medicare, Medicaid and the insurance companies fail to even keep up with inflation, let alone increased costs. Our employees expect their yearly raises, bonuses, and cost of living adjustments as well as their fringe benefits. The bottom line is that physicians are becoming increasingly frustrated and are left with little options. The financial burdens are causing physicians to cease practicing and many will change what they will and will not do.
Many physicians are looking at ownership in other healthcare entities or other investment businesses to survive. Some local physicians are working second jobs at Urgent Care and other facilities to make ends meet.
For your information, the Salary in 2004 for Humana’s CEO was $723,115 with a bonus of $1,247,373 and stock options totaling $24,133,460. The UnitedHealth Care’s CEO, in 2004, made $2,176,973 with a bonus of $5,550,000. He has cashed out $114,552,832 in stock options over previous years and has another $139,598,622 in stock options available.
This occurred while they paid physicians less than Medicare rates for most of our services.
Physicians cannot negotiate fees as a group and cannot discuss options of whether to collectively terminate contracts with providers because of legal issues. This places us at an unfair advantage and continually ties our hands. In addition, insurance companies will not provide us with a complete fee schedule to base our decisions. They only give us a few codes on common procedures. Some of the billing issues were discussed in last weeks postings. There are numerous other problems related to the medical billing system and the insurance industry.
As the current situation and healthcare environment progresses in this manner, more physicians will be limiting what they do and who they serve. It is now at a crisis and things will need to change.
Physicians have met with Sodrel and had meeting with Cochran this morning, but because of personal reasons, he has rescheduled. Connie Sipes is working with us on future dates as well to meet.
posted by Anonymous at 5:55 AM
4 Comments:
Medrep,
I’ve never meant to imply that physicians were the only group having difficulties. But this blog is about healthcare issues and this is a problem that will continually limit access to care for patients. Certainly compared to other areas in healthcare, each of the other professional services (nursing, X-ray techs, med. Techs, etc) have seen increases in base salaries out of necessity to maintain staffing although these many times are not adequate either.
Brandon,
Without specifics, I can assure you that I generated more than that, but what I took home was much less than the $200,000 you listed. Primary care docs would be elated if we made that, as most everyone else in the working world. What should we make from your standpoint for 70 plus hours a week and 24 hour call responsibility? Do you really believe that physician salaries are the major problem in the current healthcare crisis? Look at the breakdown in where healthcare dollars are spent. Physician salaries are a very small percentage of overall costs. It is like people who state Tort Reform is the sole answer for the malpractice problem and you and I both agree it is only one small part of the much large issue. It in itself may or may not even help the problem.
I have lots of friends making more than I do in fields outside of medicine. Most are in business for themselves (restaurants, insurance, banking, law, etc.) and spend fewer hours working. Most of them got a much earlier start in their careers as well. I look at all these new subdivisions around and wonder where all the money comes from. It would take a salary larger than mine to sustain many of these houses in these new subdivisions.
Me? I'm in the "delayed gratification" business. Maybe someday the land will be worth something and I can sell it to The Gary and finally make some jack.
Meantime, if I hadn't married a social worker, I'd be eating white bread and drinking Miller Lite.
How pathetic is that?
Fortunately, I love what I do, and there's only our two mouths to feed.
The MDs I know seem to be doing pretty good. They have big houses, condos in Florida, send their kids to private schools, drive expensive foreign cars, take exotic vacations and ski trips and attend medical conferences in places like Orlando and San Diego.
Here is a link to a recent article from the ACP about the current primary care situation.
http://www.acponline.org/hpp/statehc06_1.pdf
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