Time and e-health and diabetes
I am bemused by an article in Time magazine's June 27, 2005 edition, on page 55, titled The e-Health Revolution. It's available on-line at Time for a fee (but free at LexisNexis). In it, the author states:
Read further and you'll learn that
And perhaps we'll stop asking for the best health care that somebody else's money can buy -- when we realize that it's actually our money that's being used, whether it's laundered through tax dollars, though inflated insurance premiums, or in smaller paychecks from our employers.
Bill the diabetesdoc
Diabetes.Blog.Com is a blogcompanion to our main website, the Diabetes Monitor, which you can find at www.DiabetesMonitor.com
At the Diabetes Monitor today: People with diabetes more sensitive to cardiovascular effects from air pollution
A priority for McClellan [the head of Medicare/Medicaid] is to improve the treatment of diabetes and other chronic diseases, which absorb a disproportionate amount of health-care dollars. That requires better data collection--uploading and monitoring information from glucose meters, for instance--and more communication with patients.
Read further and you'll learn that
The U.S. is No. 1 in the world in terms of health-care expenditures--a total of $ 1.8 trillion last year and rising at a rate more than twice as fast as our incomes--yet it ranked no better than 16th in a study of 22 industrialized countries in what medical professionals call outcomes. That's in part because so much of the care delivered is unnecessary--as much as one-third, according to a Dartmouth study
I'm not at all sure what we, the average patient and the average doc, can do to hold down these amazing costs. But perhaps if you and I are at least aware of the problem, we'll look for more cost-effective ways of staying healthy.And perhaps we'll stop asking for the best health care that somebody else's money can buy -- when we realize that it's actually our money that's being used, whether it's laundered through tax dollars, though inflated insurance premiums, or in smaller paychecks from our employers.
Bill the diabetesdoc
Diabetes.Blog.Com is a blogcompanion to our main website, the Diabetes Monitor, which you can find at www.DiabetesMonitor.com
At the Diabetes Monitor today: People with diabetes more sensitive to cardiovascular effects from air pollution
