Healthcare reform, rising costs: A conversation with Paul Keckley about America's 'Bitter Pill'

by Ilene MacDonald Journalist Steven Brill has been making the rounds promoting his new book, "America's Bitter Pill: Money, Politics, Backroom Deals and the Fight to Fix Our Broken Healthcare System." The book details the behind-the-scenes political infighting and industry lobbying over the Affordable Care Act (ACA). This week my colleague Ron Shinkman gave his take on Brill's latest piece and the different light it casts on healthcare finance from the prism of his social status. Last week Brill published a piece in Time about his personal experience of being a patient at New York Presbyterian where he had open heart surgery. It's a fascinating account--one that health economist and policy expert Paul Keckley, Ph.D., writes in MedCity News is a piece worth reading because, "It reminds us that healthcare is a different industry more than any other, not simply because of its size and complexity but also because in times of need, like his, none of that matters." "For Brill, the $190,000 price tag for his heart surgery was money well-spent: he survived," Keckley, managing director of the Navigant Center for Healthcare Research and Policy Analysis, writes. "But he concedes much could have been saved had it been delivered in a different system of care. And that's the bitter pill he swallowed." Recently I spoke to Keckley about Brill's latest book and some of the author's assertions that the ACA doesn't address cost containment and that the healthcare reform law will not lower...
Source: hospital impact - Category: Health Managers Authors: Source Type: blogs