Category: Policy

Global aspirations for value-based health care

The authors of the New England Journal of Medicine Catalyst article urge countries to allocate 1 percent of their health care budgets toward establishing standards and processes for assessing the value of health outcomes. What matters most to patients …

America’s health care safety net is in danger

A new health crisis is looming on the horizon in the United States, and it will affect the most vulnerable people. I am not talking about another pandemic, the downstream impact of delayed preventive screenings, or even the ongoing substance use crisis…

Are convenience stores making addiction convenient?

It is not breaking news that we are currently in the midst of a mental health and substance use disorder crisis. We saw a record number of overdose deaths in a 12-month period from May 2022 to May 2023. According to the CDC, overdose deaths totaled mor…

The rise of direct primary care in America

Health care and how individuals receive it has been at the forefront of public concern for many years. Now, more than ever, a priority should be placed on discovering amenable solutions to address the incomprehensible challenges impacting this nation&#…

High-deductible health plans: a barrier to care for chronic conditions

At the peak of the coronavirus crisis in 2020, American policymakers were faced with the critical challenge of how to encourage as many Americans as possible to be tested for and vaccinated against the COVID-19 virus. Fortunately, Congress rose to this…

To address youth mental health, we must address insurance barriers

It’s been two years since the American Academy of Pediatrics declared a national state of emergency in children’s mental health. Yet sadly, very little has changed. This year, 25 percent of youth have been diagnosed with a mental health con…

Post-pandemic nursing workforce challenges continue to mount

The nurse and clinician workforce crisis in the United States is a complex issue with multiple contributing factors that include clinical staff burnout, unmanageable workloads, the departure of nurses reaching retirement age, and the pandemic’s l…

Physician well-being: Overcoming administrative hurdles

Representatives of a battered and stressed Canadian medical profession gathered in Montreal and virtually last week for the 7th annual Canadian Conference on Physician Health (CCPH) – the first such meeting in four years and the largest to date. One of…

Health care’s hidden problem: hospital primary care losses

Health care is constantly evolving, and it’s no secret that many hospitals are bleeding money when it comes to their primary care practices. On the low end, a hospital loses $127,000 per year on a primary care physician. Anecdotally, a rural hosp…

From fishing licenses to gun control

My son’s favorite thing to do is fish. I bought him a brand-new Mickey the Mouse fishing pole and a tackle box for his birthday. His favorite spot was on a small inland lake in a state park. On the bank of the lake, we would fish underneath a lar…