Reduced Physician Fees!

Recently CMS announced their proposed physicians fees for 2023, https://www.cms.gov/newsroom/press-releases/cms-proposes-physician-payment-rule-expand-access-high-quality-care. Ultimately, they have reduced their reimbursement rates, which has many physicians concerned. Honestly, we should all be concerned.

Reducing physicians’ fees is not the answer, especially when we are experiencing significant inflation, and we see insurance and pharmaceutical companies hit record breaking years (https://www.fiercehealthcare.com/payers/unitedhealth-was-2021s-most-profitable-payer-heres-look-what-its-competitors-earned) (https://www.fiercepharma.com/special-reports/top-10-most-profitable-pharma-companies-2021). This begs the question why are we NOT focusing on the real issues within healthcare and its increase costs?

Reducing fees will have consequences such as reduced access to care and an increase in physician burnout, which is already significantly high (https://www.forbes.com/sites/robertpearl/2022/04/26/physician-burnout-is-increasing-gender-inequality-is-making-it-worse/). This will have a negative impact on patient care and it’s outcomes. This is because physicians will be short staffed, unable to focus on their patients needs, and perpetuates the issue of reactionary care instead of proactive care.

Physicians are taking hit after hit and it’s left on them to fix many of these issues, at least within their own practice. So, they attempt to leverage technology for efficiency and effectiveness. One would think with all the innovation there would be multiple solutions to address physicians’ issues and more, unfortunately it’s not that simple.

Digital health is expected to grow to over $400BN by 2027 (https://www.gminsights.com/industry-analysis/digital-health-market) with that comes a lot of disparity. It’s up to the physicians to manage different systems and ensure they are all playing nice together as it relates to managing their patients. There is one problem with that, physicians are trained as clinicians not technologists. Having said that, I am a believer in focusing on what we have control over. Technology can have a positive impact on helping physicians combat burnout and lower fee schedules. By streamlining technical solutions that support physicians ability to effectuate quality coverage to their patients. Specifically, eliminate those administrative burdens and bureaucratic tasks allowing them to focus on patient care.

Technology such as automated transcription allows physicians to focus on their patients at the time of care and not on capturing notes (for the insurance company). While progress notes are important to capture in order to benefit the patient, they should not be captured the old way. Additionally, what good are notes if we cannot leverage them for actionable steps. Machine learning (ML) has made some significant strides within healthcare and can help in this area. ML has the ability to extract key pieces of information from those transcriptions and leverage them for progress notes and/or insurance claims. Lastly, syncing patient data for improved management and adherence. Today physicians have to manage multiple technological platforms to manage interactions with their patients. Leveraging a system that centralizes this data and efficiently integrates with others is key in reducing or even eliminating wasted time for the physician.

Using the right technology in the right way allows physicians to create greater efficiency, eliminate wasted time, and focus on patient care.