September 29th, 2009 by Dr. Val Jones in Expert Interviews, Video
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My friend and fellow blogger, Paul Levy, is the CEO of Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC) in Boston. He was recently listed as one of the “top 9 people to watch in healthcare” – thanks to his pioneering efforts on behalf of patient safety and transparency of hospital quality data.
I recently interviewed Paul to get his take on how patients can plan for a safe hospital stay, and what Paul is doing at BIDMC to advance quality care for all. Many thanks to Johnson & Johnson for the unrestricted grant that allowed me to create the videos.
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yV1oRLNtLhc
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YY1GJPQ_0uI
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zRWS4p9t-9Q
Check out Johnson & Johnson’s YouTube Health Channel for more great videos.
September 21st, 2009 by DrWes in Better Health Network, Opinion
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Here’s a dumb thought: If you want to save costs on medical devices to the federal government, require a tax fee concessions of $4 billion dollars from the medical device companies to fund a health care overhaul.
Now either that $4 billion will get added to the cost of devices (and the patient/insurer’s tab) or the device companies will decide that they must pay the fee to maintain their current pricing.
Government pressures hospitals and doctors by paying less, so hospitals keep the heat on medical device makers to lower costs so they can make their margins.
It all sounds good, right?
But according to one analyst, it seems device makers would rather pay the fee than make their prices transparent:
But the mechanism for how devices companies might pay matters more than what they pay, according to Morgan Stanley analyst David Lewis. “A ‘flat tax’ is preferable, in our view, to targeted industry fees as our larger concern is the creation of more infrastructure intended to catalyze pricing transparency,” he said.
And so, with the fee, the government pays itself while the medical device prices continue to remain inflated.
Why do the patients always seem to lose with these government-mandated scenarios?
-Wes
*This blog post was originally published at Dr. Wes*
October 27th, 2008 by Dr. Val Jones in Medblogger Shout Outs, Opinion
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There is nothing concealed that will not be disclosed, or hidden that will not be made known.
– Mat 10:26
The Internet may be fueling the fulfillment of an ancient prophecy – that there will come a day when nothing can be kept hidden or secret. Of course, early adopters of full transparency are regarded as reckless by some (potentially those who have something to hide?) and laudable by others (though they may be afraid to follow suit). In today’s Boston Globe there is an article about my friend and fellow blogger, Paul Levy. Paul is the CEO of Beth Israel/Deaconess, leading the charge to make hospital errors a matter of public record.
Paul writes about the errors made at his hospital (and many other subjects) in his popular medical blog, Running A Hospital. The blog won the “Best Medical Blog of 2007” award, and he is the first (and perhaps only) hospital CEO that has adopted such a high view of transparency. And for that, I commend him.
In my experience, hospital errors are alarmingly common. Read more »
