Doctors become very creative when they need their income to rise

From a story on the challenges of Medicare in the Washington Post:

From 2000 to 2008, the volume of services per Medicare patient rose 42 percent. Some of this was because of the increasing availability of sophisticated treatments that undoubtedly save lives. Some was because of doctors practicing "defensive medicine" - ordering every conceivable test to shield themselves from malpractice lawsuits down the line.

"Then you have doctors who order an MRI for an unremarkable headache or at the first sign of back pain," said Robert Berenson, a Commissioner of the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission, an independent congressional agency. "It's pretty well documented that it doesn't help patients to have those scans done in these cases. But if you have the machine in your office ... why not?"

 Whatever the cause, the explosion in the volume of services provided helps explain why Medicare's total payments to doctors per patient rose 51 percent from 2000 to 2008.

A review of physicians' incomes suggests that specialists - who have more opportunities to increase the volume of the services they offer than primary-care doctors - reaped most of the benefit.

This is why you should be very skeptical of a politician that wants to keep healthcare between "the patients and the doctors." Doctors don't always have your best interest in mind. Many times they have their own financial interests in mind. Which means you are getting ripped off. Of course we are not talking about all doctors, but there are plenty out there that are too worried about their own income.

Isn't it ironic that doctors are rationing healthcare for seniors? If a doctor refuses to see seniors because he or she is unhappy with the payment, isn't that rationing?

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