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Medicare Says It Won’t Cover Hospital Errors
Following up on a previous thread, what do you think of this development? It's clearly a double-edged sword. Sure the government and insurance companies should pay less (or nothing) for inferior services - or even fine docs/hospitals who are guilty of clear errors/negligence/judgment lapses/etc. If we normal people perform poorly at work, we won't get a raise and might even be demoted/fired. Medical professionals should be no different. People respond well to incentives and punishments, especially financial ones. But now paranoid docs/hospitals will go to all ends to find something wrong with incoming patients, in order to avoid blame if the patients develop infections or whatnot while in their care. And as I heard on the radio, probably it would be unethical to run a battery of tests on a critical care patient rushed to the ER, just to demonstrate pre-existing medical issues. Or would they flat out refuse to treat people who might be financial hazards to them? So maybe this decision will further alienate medical care providers from the most at-risk patients who need them. Counter-productive or long overdue?
August 23, 2007 at 09:13 am by scotty_ng1, 744 views, 1 comment






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gryphonat 08:22 on September 5th, 2007
Medicare may not cover it, but private insurance will.