Radical Surgery
Reconstructing the American Health Care System
by
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Chapter 7 The National Health Care Plan In this section we will lay out the structure and mechanics of a health care plan, one that represents a dramatic but achievable alternative and which will guarantee health care for all Americans. This alternative uses the existing provider system but changes the rules of the game so they work for, rather than at cross purposes with, the benefit of the American people. This National Health Care Plan (NHCP) works because it corrects the basic flaws of the current health care system. It:
The assumptions upon which the system is constructed are:
- Health care is a basic right of citizenship
- If we have the best providers in the world we must endeavor to take good care of them.
- For a system to work we must place our faith in someone and we elect to place our faith in our physicians.
- It is okay for providers to make a profit. Profits are not bad, even for physicians. Critics of the existing system spend too much time lamenting their erroneous judgment that doctors and other providers are corrupted by an insatiable desire for profits. What we need is a system in which providers are rewarded for taking good care of their patients.
- Abuses of this or any system are inevitable. Rather than implement costly systems in a hopeless attempt to place controls at the end of the process, we provide internal controls in the form of incentives that reward excellence. Abuses, when identified, will require sanctions.
- The more we can minimize the role of government in health care, the better.
Our purpose in this section is to give the reader an easy overview of the plan and how it will work. In the chapters that follow we will delve into the details. We will compare the economics of this new system with that within which we now live. We will strive to show how the plan is likely to impact all of the actors in the health care drama, whether patients, providers or institutions. Finally we will attempt to address the questions, challenges and concerns of all parties, to the extent they can be anticipated.
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About the Book
There are few issues on the American agenda that affect as many people as health care and about which so little is being done. Whether access to care for the uninsured or prescription drugs for the elderly, there is a sense of urgency among the populace, and also a sense of futility. The u. S. health care system is so vast and complex even the most visionary of our leaders struggle to embrace its full breadth and scope. Reform efforts initiated by political leaders and industry professionals rarely look at the health care system as an integral whole. Reformers, guided by their own political agendas and vested interests, focus instead on symptoms and offer remedies that stretch the system into new shapes and propose regulations that restrict and complicate it. The pervasive power of special interest groups also contributes as meaningful reforms are so diluted they become meaningless. The health care system in place today is unacceptable and the evidence of a need for dramatic change is compelling. At home or at our jobs, we will fiddle with a tool or process for only so long before we conclude there must be a better way. We then step back to re-examine our purpose and we construct a new tool, one designed to serve our specific objectives. Radical Surgery leads the reader through a comparable process and offers a new vision of the American health care system, one that draws upon the author's experience as a medical group manager, as a director of a 500-bed, long-term care facility, and as a leader and problem solver in both the public and private sectors. The outcome is a National Health Care Plan that:
About the Author
A former manager of a
multi-specialty medical group practice, Mel Hawkins has also served as a
director of a county-owned, 500-bed, long-term care facility, with terms as
both President and Chair of the Finance Committee. The author has also served
as Court Executive of a unified trial court, Chief Operating Officer of a
industrial distribution and inventory management company, principle of a
management consulting practice and a small business owner, giving Mr. Hawkins
nearly thirty years of leadership experience in both the public and private
sectors. This varied leadership experience has given Mr. Hawkins a unique and
eclectic perspective, one that has served him well as an innovator and problem
solver.
Educated at Manchester
College where he received a BA degree in Religion and Philosophy and Peace
Studies, the author also earned a Master of Science in Education from Saint
Francis College and a Master of Public Affairs from Indiana University.
It was during his
tenure as a medical group manager that it became apparent to Mel, that there
must be a way to deliver health care to the whole population, without
sacrificing the great strengths of the American health care system.
Mel Hawkins resides
with his wife in Fort Wayne, Indiana, their three children now grown.
Active in his
community, Mr. Hawkins attended Leadership Fort Wayne. In addition to his work
on the Board of Managers of Byron Health Center, he has also served on the
board of the Martin Luther King Montessori School; as a co-founder and a board
member of the Boys and Girls Club of Fort Wayne and, as a co-founder, board
member and former president of the South Side Business Group of Fort Wayne and
Allen County.