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Dr. Ceren: WARNING - Managed Care May Be Dangerous To Your Health Several years ago, the filing
of bankruptcy by FPA in San Diego should have alerted the public
to the true purpose of managed care. FPA, and other similar commercial
enterprises termed managed care cannot deliver adequate service
to patients and payment to doctors when proceeds are spent on
an outrageous severance package of over four million dollars to
the CEO, and salaries over one million dollars a year to each
executive. FPA is not unique in their industry. These schemers
represent the lowest rung on the food chain!
Armed with a good financial backing,
a slick team of attorneys, a creative advertising firm, and a
sales force well versed in launching a clever, seductive campaign,
managed health care companies make promises they have no intention
of keeping. If those who buy into this scheme used common sense
and simple arithmetic they would see that administrative costs
and payments to executives would eat up the corporations ability
to provide good care.
Before doctors joined these plans
they had spent most of their time practicing their craft and keeping
abreast of the latest developments in their fields. They had little
time or interest to learn about business, and they too, have been
suckered.
San Diego has the largest population
of patients per capita on managed care in the country. To maintain
a practice, health care professionals have felt the need to join
preferred provider groups. Experience has shown that they have
sold their professions to the devil. Instead of spending quality
time helping people, doctors face mounds of paper work and waste
time on the phone coping with demands from managed care quarters.
Decisions effecting patient's health cannot be made without the
approval, in many cases, of someone whose credentials are questionable
and whose role is to cut costs.
Is this the quality of care we
deserve? Adequate health care should be the right of every human
being. The United States and South Africa are the only industrialized
countries that do not provide universal health care to its people.
We must prevail upon our legislators
to right this wrong.
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