An August 17th CNN article explores the challenges facing Obamacare. It notes that major insurers are losing hundreds of millions of dollars and are therefore drastically scaling back their participation in the exchange. The core issue is that the people who are in good health are not signing up in sufficient numbers to compensate for those in poor health who are enrolling. In past posts I’ve discussed the healthcare crisis in America where the top issues are heart disease, cancer, type-2 diabetes, dementia and obesity. Again, the only proven solution in the prevention or lessening of these issues is to eat right and exercise.
The current culture in America for most people is to go to the doctor to treat problems as they happen. That is well and good, but most of the issues that doctors are treating are preventable. To reduce the cost of healthcare the conversation has to change to prevention through a healthy diet and exercise.
A key part of the problem is the compensation structure of our current system. To a large extent medical professionals are compensated for patients they treat and procedures they perform. The more procedures they perform the higher their reimbursements. The more patients they see the higher their compensation. Note the misalignment here. They are not (again for the most part) compensated for preventing illnesses, but rather for treating them. Also, they are actually penalized for spending very much time with any patient because doing so comes with great opportunity cost. Fortunately we have some outstanding physicians in our country who, at their own expense, choose to assist with prevention and spend more time with patients. Rather than throwing more money into an every growing demand for treatment, we need to fight the problem at the source and educate and enable people to make dietary and lifestyle choices that will promote health and wellness.
ProHealthy 365’s mission is to improve health and happiness by helping people to eat the right foods. It is a key part of the nation’s healthcare solution and as the United States changes it’s focus to prevention many of the issues facing the health systems will be greatly reduced.