The "public option"

[The Brain]

I thought this thread was about sex.

[alfred russel]

I think that's part of the problem honestly.  With no cost disincentive doctros wind up ordering a lot of unnecessary tests and procedures, which leads to long waits for those tests to be completed.

I would rather have that then err on the side of the equation like the US where procedures that a doctor thinks is necessary is turned down by some insurance bean counter.

With how much more we spend on healthcare and how our spending is concentrated away from the uninsured, I would think that our system has more procedures performed that are questionable from a cost/benefit perspective.

[crazy canuck]

That's exactly it - over the last decade.  With medical school taking 4 years, plus a number of years of residency, plus the delay in actually getting those new openings, those moves (which have been taken in other jurisdictions) are only barely showing any progress at this point.

Depends on what you mean by "showing progress".  The number of seats in medical schools has more then doubled and the number of seats in nursing schools has, I think, more then tripled.  That is significant progress.  Since provinces are in charge of health care, I dont much care what is happening in NFLD or any other province.  All I care about is the number of doctors being turned out here.

If you measure progress in terms of wait lists, that has also improved here in B.C. partly because the number of doctors has increased - particularly in the specialty areas.

Where BC is really failing (and I think this is true in other jurisdictions as well) is in attracting family doctors.  As a result more and more people have to resort to walk in clinics and see doctors who dont know their history.  Part of the reason we have this problem is because Doctors can make so much more money doing other things.

[Barrister]

Depends on what you mean by "showing progress".  The number of seats in medical schools has more then doubled and the number of seats in nursing schools has, I think, more then tripled.  That is significant progress.  Since provinces are in charge of health care, I dont much care what is happening in NFLD or any other province.  All I care about is the number of doctors being turned out here.

By "showing progress" I mean by making noticeable increases in the number of doctors per capita.  Increasing seats in medical school will help down the road, but I don't think a noticeable number of those new spaces have translated into practising doctors yet.

[crazy canuck]

With how much more we spend on healthcare and how our spending is concentrated away from the uninsured, I would think that our system has more procedures performed that are questionable from a cost/benefit perspective.

Maybe.  My point is that when we compare the two systems we have to be careful to compare apples to apples.  Everyone here is "insured" so maybe that is not realistic.

[crazy canuck]

By "showing progress" I mean by making noticeable increases in the number of doctors per capita.  Increasing seats in medical school will help down the road, but I don't think a noticeable number of those new spaces have translated into practising doctors yet.

The increase in those seats took place at least 5 or 6 years ago, perhaps more.  I will see if I can dig something up.

[crazy canuck]

BB here is a news release from 2005 that provided some of the detail.  The expansion of seats I was thinking about was announced in 2002 but it looks like there has been a lot more expansion since then.

http://www2.news.gov.bc.ca/news_releases_2005-2009/2005HEALTH0039-001058-Attachment1.htm