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GEN: Crisis on the Horizon?From: art fougner, md (evsono@pipeline.com)Wed Dec 31 06:51:59 2003
Tuesday, December 30, 2003 WASHINGTON — Dr. Brian Lewis is going out of business. The Washington area heart specialist who has been putting in about 100 pacemakers and 20 to 30 defibrillators a year for the 10 years he has specialized in cardiology said the federal government has forced him to look for other income. Between the cost of malpractice insurance (search) and the 40 percent reimbursement rate offered by Medicare (search), Lewis said he couldn't afford to remain in private practice. "If I get paid, it's most likely that I'll get paid at Medicare rates, not the rate that I set, but Medicare rated. And when the patient tries to pay anything additional, that's not allowed, that's illegal," he told Fox News. The plight is not unusual for doctors like Lewis, one of many specialists who treat ailments that frequently affect older Americans and are feeling the Medicare pinch. Free-market advocates say that as baby boomers reach Medicare age, more heart doctors and other specialists will leave the profession because Medicare reimbursements will squeeze them out of business. "The more Medicare patients they see, the harder it is for them to recoup the costs that it takes to care for these patients," said Nina Owcharenko, a health care policy analyst for the Washington-based Heritage Foundation (search). But at least one lobbyist said plenty of students are entering the medical field, and specialists, like cardiologists, are earning plenty. "We're not experiencing problems in Medicare, even if some individuals are having some individual problems," said Ron Pollack, executive director and vice president of Families USA (search). http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,106920,00.html Happy and Healthy 2004 to All. art
-- art fougner, md ich bin ein New Yorker
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