Thursday, June 23, 2011

Here's an idea: Pull together a panel of average citizens and ask THEM to take a look at health care and what they think needs to be done. The Globe's Andre Picard summarizes here what the group of 28 Ontarians recommended as part of the Citizens' Reference Panel on Health Services.
If you like your information full-on, read the full report here. It's 44 pages, but there's also a one-page summary. 
Nothing world-shaking in the panel's findings, but that's the point. It doesn't take shiny new equipment, expensive new drugs and an influx of even more health-care professionals to fix much of what ails the "health" system - it just takes common sense and policy-makers brave enough to get beyond the individual interests of the big players.
Note the recommendation to end the fee-for-service pay system for doctors. Yes, please - the incentives are all wrong in that system, resulting in high costs to taxpayers with no assurances that all that spending is actually resulting in a healthier population. Governments are all about "outcomes" these days - why should the medical system be exempt?

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