a Due to the fragmented nature of the U.S. healthcare system I do not believe
the government should be in a central position to issue physician practice
guidelines based on cost and efficiency. Physician practice guidelines have
shown the ability to improve patient health outcomes by recommending
evidence based treatment options. These evidence based treatment options
are often at a lower cost than alternative more experimental treatment
options. Another benefit of physician practice guidelines is that they
improve the consistency of the healthcare being delivered to avoid issues
such as health inequity.
a With that being said, government issued physician practice guidelines
could simply end up being wrong. There could be oversights and it would be
incredibly difficult for the government to involve all of the proper system
matter experts needed to issue an overarching set of physician practice
guidelines. Also physician practice guidelines based on cost and efficiency
alone may lead to worse patient outcomes as necessary treatments may not
be recommended if the government deems them to be high-cost or
inefficient. The government issued physician practice guidelines may also
limit the research and development of new treatment options that may cure
chronic diseases. The government also has a variety of agencies such as
Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, the Agency for Healthcare
Research & Quality, and the National Institutes of Health just to name a few.
With so many different government agencies who would be responsible for
maintaining and updating a government issued set of physician practice
guidelines?
a I feel that the government would be in a great position to offer
recommendations for physician practice guidelines and to intervene if a
particular organization's physician practice guidelines are leading to
malpractice. What would be a better approach in my opinion would be to
allow the many different healthcare organizations and hospitals to create
their own physician practice guidelines acknowledging the government's
regulations. This would allow each healthcare center and hospital the
opportunity to find the most effective set of guidelines that leads to a
reduction in cost, and an increase in efficiency and quality care for their
specific patient population. Best practices will emerge which can be
implemented in the government's recommendations for physician practice
guidelines
References:
Lee, T. H., & Robert S. Kaplan and Michael E. Porter. (2015, September
14). The strategy that Will Fix Health Care. Harvard Business Review.
Retrieved from https://hbr.org/2013/10/the-strategy-that-will-fix-health-
care
Shi, L. (2018). Essentials of the U.S. Health Care System (5th Edition).
Jones & Bartlett Learning.
https://mbsdirect.vitalsource.com/books/9781284174144
Steven H. Woolf, M. D. (1990, September 1). Practice guidelines: A new
reality in medicine. Archives of Internal Medicine. Retrieved from
https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamainternalmedicine/article-
abstract/613805
a a Woolf, S. H., Grol, R., Hutchinson, A., Eccles, M., & Grimshaw, J.
(1999, February 20). Clinical guidelines: Potential a a a a a a a benefits,
limitations, and harms of clinical guidelines. BMJ (Clinical research ed.).
Retrieved from a a a a a a a a a a a
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1114973/
