For two years, the Covid-19 pandemic shook financial markets, ruled media coverage, and disrupted life in tactics most Americans would never have anticipated.
But now, in the third year, the coronavirus has been downgraded to a persistent but manageable threat, on par with the flu. Thanks to some familiar medical responses — vaccines, antiviral drugs, and public protective measures — three-quarters of Americans say the worst about covid-19 is us.
Now a new disaster is looming. U. S. Health CareThe U. S. is in the direct path of the best storm.
Apocalyptic predictions turn out to be incorrect or exaggerated. But, in 2004, a team of hurricane experts from Louisiana State University predicted that “a disaster [is] right on the horizon. “They were right. Less than a year later, New Orleans was 11 feet underwater. Hurricane Katrina killed another 1,833 people and left thousands more homeless.
How did the researchers know that Katrina was approaching? Using data-driven PC simulations, they observed a confluence of life-threatening forces (expanding heat, low sampling, maximum wind speeds, shipping disruptions, and more) that, when combined, would lead to some destruction.
A scenario is developing in the care of the American physical condition.
Decades of rising costs combined with quality erosion and misuse of technologies have made U. S. physical care more expensive. The U. S. is the “most expensive and least efficient” formula in the evolved world. In themselves, those prolonged fitness disorders are manageable and may have resolved over time, familiar solutions.
However, this before the arrival of a trio of “megaforces” that now threaten to create the medical edition of the best storm. Without pressing and radical solutions, those forces will mix to produce a major medical catastrophe, which will prove far more destructive and costly than Covid-19.
In my 2021 Uncaring eBook, I predicted that federal COVID-19 relief efforts, totaling trillions, would lead to immediate inflation. However, I did not foresee that a series of global events: the war in Ukraine, oil shortages abroad, and persistent pressure on the chain of origin would come into play and, taken together, drive U. S. inflation. U. S. to a maximum of 40 years.
Without those additional pressures, our country has had five to ten years to resolve the thorniest disorders in physical care. Instead, the United States can no longer afford to play with payment models or lead the long-term transformation of medical practice.
Most public fitness officials and patients don’t realize that fitness care costs are about to skyrocket. They mistakenly compare the rising costs of today’s customers to the moderate rate of fitness care inflation.
But unlike gas, grocery, and lodging rates, health care rates don’t adjust in real time. Instead, the fee for everything from nurses’ salaries to bandages to prescription drugs is set one to two years in advance and remains in effect for 12 to 24 months. .
When those contracts come to renewal this fall, it will be to pay the piper.
Labor in the fitness sector is a must and costly. The same goes for raw fabrics and supply chain costs. The same factors that increased client costs by 8-9% are likely to drive fitness care costs to unaffordable levels for decades. come.
Starting next year, most U. S. fitness insurers will be able to do so. U. S. families plan to increase employer premiums by 10 to 15 percent, and U. S. families are likely to be able to raise employers’ premiums. U. S. consumers pay an even higher percentage of their percentage of fitness care costs.
Last Friday, my friend, a surgeon, called at four o’clock in the afternoon. to cancel dinner plans. He told me that one of his patients who scheduled surgery that morning was still waiting for his surgery. Since the patient had not been allowed to eat or drink anything since the night before, the doctor did not need to cancel the appointment. procedure and having to reschedule it.
Surgical delays and cancellations are becoming more common. One thing that is being deciphered is the growing shortage of nurses.
According to several studies, a third of RNs are leaving their current position, while many intend to leave the task market altogether. More than 1 in four baby boomer AIs intend to retire within a year.
This relief in the number of patients poses a great challenge for patients. Literally, hospitals cannot function without enough nurses. operating rooms, where experienced nurses are imperative for optimal patient care. When hospitals can’t meet those numbers, care is delayed and patients will have to be turned away.
It assumes that a simple solution would be to increase enrollment in nursing schools and increase elegance sizes. But practicing nurses is expensive and time-consuming. It takes at least five years to prepare nursing scholars to provide bedside care and further exercise them for the operating room. To further complicate the problem, a qualified nurse is needed to teach nursing students practical bedside patient care techniques.
And in the context of the nurse shortage, hospital administrations are reluctant to assign experienced nurses to training roles rather than care roles, even if the former is the most productive option in the long run.
With the twin threats of inflation and nursing staff shortages, hospital directors feel trapped in situations where everyone loses. They know that aggressively expanding wages to hire and retain nurses will cause prices to skyrocket, while cutting wages to cover ever higher prices will lead to the resignation of more nurses. .
Without quick fixes, surgical delays will pile up and even fully insured patients will have their surgeries delayed or postponed. This will result in worse and worse outcomes, preventable headaches and even death.
When my friend called me the next day, he told me that his patient had nevertheless had been operated on at 2 am. Fortunately, the case went well. When I asked him how the circle of relatives reacted, he replied, “They are still angry. “
Even before the pandemic, doctors reported burnout rates of 44% or more. Today, after two years of mounting lawsuits and an endless parade of patient deaths, the emotional trauma of healthcare professionals has reached a boiling point.
Shortages of nurses and staff, combined with cost-cutting efforts through insurers and hospital administrators, have only fueled discontent.
Doctors, who reject the word “burnout,” refer to the challenge as a “moral wound,” a pain that comes from the inability to provide proper medical care. Doctors say hospital directors and insurance company executives are more concerned with profits than patients. In addition, doctors feel they don’t get the respect and appreciation they deserve for all their hard work.
As a result, disgruntled doctors turn to personal justice companies for better pay and during their daily lives. Private equity leaders recognize that this is a great financial opportunity.
The PE technique is first recruiting as many specialists from the network as possible (with a specific eye on the types of doctors hospitals want to keep in business: anesthesiologists, emergency physicians, orthopedists, urologists, and cardiologists). Second, after taking control of the market through consolidation, personal equity firms demand specifically higher reimbursements from insurer and hospital doctors (25% or more).
Between 2010 and 2019, annual personal equity investments in physical care increased from $42 billion to $120 billion. Naturally, the last thing those corporations need are refunds. And as burnout continues to intensify, more and more doctors will take this path, exacerbating the physical condition burden of care crisis.
As with Katrina, this vicious mix of forces, which will affect all medical practices at once, will inflict great damage. Double-digit inflation, primary shortage of nurses and monopoly of medical specialists through personal capital, in addition to persistent pre-Covid. 19 fitness disorders: they will produce a mega disaster unless we take urgent and ambitious action.
The old answers (i. e. , monetary incentives and the assignment of doctors and nurses to ever-increasing patient burdens) simply won’t work. Try to raise nurses’ salaries or accede to requests for personal equity and we will exacerbate the inflation of physical care. reducing staff, and increasing the dissatisfaction of nurses and doctors and compromising access.
Approaching the 3 mega forces in combination will require a technique radically different from that of the past. The main points of this solution will be the subject of my next article. To get this story in your inbox, click the “FOLLOW” button as the most sensitive of this article.
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