by Chuck Ring (GadaboutBlogalot ©2009).

Quote Freely From The Article – Leave The Pseudonym Alone

According to think tanks from 33 states there are very viable alternatives to health plans now being bandied about by Congress and President Obama. The following is to be the meat and potatoes of the plan.

Patient-Centered Health Care Reform:

• Leverages Health Savings Accounts (HSAs). HSAs empower individuals to monitor their health care costs and create incentives for individuals to use only those services that are necessary;

• Allows interstate purchasing of insurance. Policies in some states are more affordable because they include fewer bells and whistles, and consumers should be empowered to decide which benefits they need and what prices they are willing to pay;

• Reduces the number of mandated benefits insurers are required to cover. Empowering consumers to choose which benefits they need is only effective if insurers are able to fill these needs;

• Reallocates the majority of Medicaid spending into simple vouchers for low-income individuals to purchase their own insurance. An income-based sliding scale voucher program would eliminate much of the massive bureaucracy that is needed to implement today’s complex and burdensome Medicaid system and produce considerable cost savings;

• Eliminates unnecessary scope-of-practice laws and allow non-physician health care professionals practice to the extent of their education and training. Retail clinics have shown that increasing the provider pool safely increases competition and access to care and empowers the patient to decide from whom they receive their care;

• Reforms tort liability laws. Defensive medicine needlessly drives up medical costs and creates an adversarial relationship between doctors and patients

I don’t believe any of these ideas are entirely new and different from those considered to some extent in past years, but I especially lean toward something like the next to last and last bullets.

The information in this blog post comes from BigGovernment.com here or, if you prefer, you can access the complete article here

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