Money-Driven Medicine: The Problem Of High Health Care Cost And Misdiagnosis In America

One out of five American adults struggle to pay health care related costs. Whether it was skipping out on groceries, clothing, rent or just not being able to pay their medical bills at all. Over sixty percent used their savings over half took on extra work to pay the bills. Some simply just cut back on taking their prescription medication all together causing their conditions to get worse. Health care cost forced roughly 35 percent to rack up high-interest credit card debt whereas 15 percent took out loans. The reason American health care cost so much is due to the new technologies and drugs, direct malpractice costs, and misdiagnoses. As a result, healthcare now is about quantity over quality and unnecessary treatments.

In American health care several people go through unnecessary procedures and misdiagnoses. Due to the unnecessary treatments Americans spend a lot of money on healthcare that doesn’t benefit them at all and possibly putting them in debt. In the Documentary, Money Driven Medicine, Maggie looks of a two trillion-dollar industry, healthcare field, to witness how billions of dollars are wasted. While interviewing doctors, hospital administrators, patients, health care economists, corporate executives’ analysts describes a war of “all against all” that turn physicians, hospitals, insurers, drug makers and device makers against each other. Maggie explains that we spend twice as much as Japan in health care, yet few would argue that our health care system is twice as good. Instead, new details suggest that one out of every three of our health care dollars is wasted on unnecessary or repeated test; unwanted procedures and overpriced drugs and devices that are no better than the less expensive products they have replaced.

American health care cost so much is due to direct malpractice costs, and misdiagnoses. According to “20 Percent of patients with serious conditions are first misdiagnosed, study says, ” roughly 12 million people who seek outpatient care are misdiagnosed annually. 21 percent of the second diagnosis was noticeably different only 12 percent were the same. Those that go thru misdiagnoses usually have a bill twice the price of someone that only has one visit. According to the National Academy of Medicine most people will receive and incorrect diagnosis or a diagnosis to late at least once in their live. Misdiagnoses will cause malpractice such as procedures and cost. This means people are getting surgeries and operations that they don’t always need on top of the operations and surgeries that they do need. This doesn’t only have double the cost but can be worse in the long run going thru surgeries you don’t always need.

As a patient the worst thing you can find out is that you were incorrectly diagnosed. According to the article “The Real Problem with Misdiagnosis” is after getting your history, performing a physical examination and testing to confirm possible diagnoses. You still have a good chance your first diagnosis won’t be correct. Doctors and physicians don’t have enough time in a single visit to go thru all these steps the risk of misdiagnosis rises. During the follow up visit they can identify the problems and diagnose can often be changed. Later in the article the author explains that computers show greater accuracy in diagnosis than physicians. Later in the article Larry Weed, American Physician, goes on to talk about his belief that the lack of software tools is one reason that we may be misdiagnosis. He states how it is rare that clinicians can compile a list of potential diagnoses and simply choose just one that “fits”. Having doctors and medical professionals talk about how the software and technology has a greater diagnosis then physicians. As patients we rely on physicians and their medical knowledge to correctly diagnosis us when we seek medical professional advice.

Misdiagnosis goes hand in hand with cost. The more you are misdiagnosis the more money you are going to spend on hospital bills whether it’s thru your deductible or paying in full out of pocket. Paying out of pocket people have taken out loans, maxed out credit cards, even gotten a part time/second job to help with the cost. According to Kaiser Health News, estimated at least $200 billion is wasted annually on excessive testing and treatment. With the possibly of harming patients, making mistakes and injuries believed have caused over 30, 000 deaths each year. Cedars-Sinai is the largest hospital in the nation with $3. 3 billion revenue but reported net income of $301 million. That’s just under 3 billon dollars that has disappeared. Also $200 billion wasted annually on excessive testing and treatment that us as patients are paying for them to test us and run lab work sometimes before even admitting us. Misdiagnosis is a huge problem for patients. In the article written by Honor Whiteman She goes on to explain how BMJ Quality and Safety, revealed that the annual rate of outpatient diagnostic errors stands a little above 5 percent which is equal to 12 million adults or 1 in 20. It is unclear how many have been harmed from their misdiagnoses but around 50% percent of errors have the potential to lead to severe harm. While in the article “1 in 20 American Adults Misdiagnosed in Outpatient Clinics each year” Dr. Singh goes on to say that the reason this happens is because outpatient environments are busy which cusses the physicians into time-pressured conditions that may lead to uncertainty in the patient’s history and symptoms.

Outpatients clinics are usually busier since they are more cost efficient. From their depending on the diagnosis is when people go to the actual emergency room. When told the diagnosis is when the patient decided if they are going to go to the emergency room. But, if you are misdiagnosed at the outpatient clinic causing you not to seek further medical attention you can be in worse harm then when you first went to the clinic. After interviewing a doctor Clifton Leaf explains how Dr. Finkelstein describes healthcare. She goes on saying like virtually everything that we do in the healthcare realm, it’s excessively complicated, and has unintended consequences. And one of those consequences is that areas where providers have a “proclivity for making diagnoses and recording them”.

Health care cost comes with no reaction of shock in America. It has now become something common for families to have to take out loans, max out credit cards even get second jobs just to stay “healthy. ” Americans now even go to the doctors wondering if they are going to be told the accurate diagnosis without having to pay for multiple opinions. As a patient we shouldn’t have to question if we are going to be told the right diagnosis or if we are getting the right treatment. Having surgeries that aren’t helping the reason we are there isn’t only costing us more as patients but can also be more harmful in the long run. Having surgeries that aren’t for the initial reason we are there are causing several more procedures and taken more time from work. Taken time off work you’re not only losing pay from the days but also costing us more for the procedures.