Physicians on the board....

[il Padrino Ute]

what are your thoughts about this?

[Uncle Ted]

I am not a physician but I think it sucks that the NYT requires us to login to read their crap.

[il Padrino Ute]

Sorry 'bout that.

[ERCougar]

IPU subscribes to the NYT?? Didn't see that one coming.

Can you give us a synopsis?

[il Padrino Ute]

IPU subscribes to the NYT?? Didn't see that one coming.

Can you give us a synopsis?

I gotta keep up on what the other side says, no?

Anyway, it's an article about the Obama administration using "mystery shoppers" to see how accessible doctors are.

A few paragraphs from the article that are pertinent:

Alarmed by a shortage of primary care doctors, Obama administration officials are recruiting a team of “mystery shoppers” to pose as patients, call doctors’ offices and request appointments to see how difficult it is for people to get care when they need it.

It also goes on about a "critical public policy problem" of a shortage of primary care, including specialists in internal and family care.

Plans for the survey have riled many doctors because the secret shoppers will not identify themselves as working for the government.


“I don’t like the idea of the government snooping,” said Dr. Raymond Scalettar, an internist in Washington. “It’s a pernicious practice — Big Brother tactics, which should be opposed.”


According to government documents obtained from Obama administration officials, the mystery shoppers will call medical practices and ask if doctors are accepting new patients and, if so, how long the wait would be. The government is eager to know whether doctors give different answers to callers depending on whether they have public insurance, like Medicaid, or private insurance, like Blue Cross and Blue Shield.

There are then a few quotes from docs around the country who oppose this saying things like the government is spying on them and that they think it's a waste of tax dollars. One doc was quoted as saying "Anyone with a brain knows we have a doctor shortage."

In response to the drumbeat of criticism, a federal health official said doctors need not worry because the data would be kept confidential. “Reports will present aggregate data, and individuals will not be identified,” said the official, who requested anonymity to discuss the plan before its final approval by the White House.

It then goes on to say that the Mass. healthcare program has resulted in long waits for appointments, such as 36 days for family docs and 48 for internists. Also, that about half of the docs in Mass. are not seeing new patients.

It seems that the reason for this is that the feds want to know what the affect Obamacare is going to have on getting healthcare once it's implemented fully. IMO, they're trying to find out if what they told the public what was going to happen is really going to happen when they were shoving Obamacare down our throats.

[ERCougar]

JIC is probably the one to answer this. It doesn't really bug me that they're studying this, but I'm not a primary care doctor.