It's pretty amazing how many aspects there are to the ballooning cost of medical care. As I wrote in my last post, prescriptions are one place where we can be more savvy. Another savings area might be less obvious: the storing of medical information.
The root of the problem here is inefficient communication. Think about a time when you had to repeat the same information over and over again. Maybe you were calling your cell phone or credit card company to ask a question, and you kept getting transferred. It's frustrating, sure, and it wastes time — and we all know time is money.
For health care, the issue is medical records. How many times have you filled out forms for your medical history? We've all seen those floor-to-ceiling files of manila folders in each doctor's office. All that information is on paper, and there's no easy way to share it between different health-care providers. The result can be agonizing delays and costly duplication of tests.
Maybe your 85-year-old grandfather needs surgery. He goes to the hospital, but soon they realize they can't do the surgery because they don't have clearance from his cardiologist saying his heart can survive the strain. A few weeks earlier your grandfather went to a cardiologist, but the surgical team never received the records from that visit.
What to do? Wait? Or repeat the tests with yet another cardiologist? Two very inefficient options.
Maybe you’ve experienced this already. The doctor sends you for a test and follow-up to discuss it, but when you get to the follow-up, the test results aren’t back. So the inefficient system just wasted your time, your doctor’s time, your money and maybe resulted in the unnecessary duplication of tests.
A friend of mine recently moved halfway across the country. In dealing with the million details of her relocation, she never had time to visit all her doctors and get copies of her records. Every once in a while she remembers those files hundreds of miles away and worries that she'll have to repeat many of the same procedures again with new doctors. Another friend actually did send all her doctors the request for files to be transferred to a new doctor, but found out the hard way several years later that the files never showed up. She’s lost about 10 years of her medical history.
One study by a think tank estimated that $81 billion could be saved annually by computerizing patient records. Both the Bush and Obama administrations have pushed for the creation of a system for local hospitals and physicians to electronically share medical records, because it could save lives and money. So why hasn't it happened? True, there are upfront costs. But other perceived barriers, like concerns about privacy, shouldn't really be barriers at all. The banking industry has overcome them, which is why we can use ATMs anywhere. I can e-file my taxes and check my financial history online at a credit agency, so we know issues such as privacy, security, misplaced competition and compatibility across technology can be addressed.
A computerized system would mean doctors could immediately see lab results and read specialists' comments on their patients. It would mean that if you show up in the emergency room, your medical history is already there — your allergies, previous blood work, past Xrays and more. That sounds like a win-win for everybody, doesn't it?
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— Susan with Regence
