CMS just announced that the spending growth rate in health care slowed to its lowest level in 50 years. Health care spending in 2008 increased 4.4% to $2.3 trillion and now represents 16.2% of our GDP- up from 15.9% in 2007. Health care spending continued to outpace the spending in the rest of our economy.
About 10 years ago the government set some goals for our country to achieve to improve the overall health of our population. Healthy People 2010 goals were built off of the Healthy People platform established over 20 years ago to set some benchmarks and measure the health and wellness of our country. How’d we do?
We’re fatter, we eat more salt and fat (not less), more have high blood pressure, and we have more children with unhealthy tooth decay.
To be fair, we did improve in lowering cancer rates, increasing smoking regulations, reducing work-injuries, and improving childhood vaccinations.
We hit 24% of the goals established in 2000, and are expecting slightly less for 2010.
At the same time, the University of Michigan recently completed a study showing that the growth in the obesity rate in this country is snuffing out the “wellness benefits” gained from the decine in the use of tobacco. We smoke less, but we’re fatter.
Bancprutcies soared in 2009 increasing over 32%. While many were related to the housing market, a substantial number can be expected to be in some way related to medical expenses.
I’m now looking over the 700 pages of “Meaningful Use” rules that will direct the implementation of Electronic Medical Records for physicians, the Genetic Information Non-Discrimination Act (GINA) that will impact the development of wellness plans for employers and their employees, and anticipating the barrage of rules that will come out of health reform, and I wonder where all of this is leading? Is innovation that can improve the health care experience for the individual (and ultimately result in lower costs) dead?
We can do better than what we’re doing today.
The individual consumer is the key and our health care system just isn’t connecting. The rules of the game that are being established aren’t making it any easier.
Health care organizations are going to need to go out of their way to connect, really connect, with the individual. They will need to understand that most will trust their doctor, but not much else. The processes we have in place are confusing and sometimes frightening. We really need to work hard to keep the individual in mind- and not just focus on meeting regulations and completing transactions. We need to create relationships.
Consumers need to step-up-to-the-plate big time. They need to be informed of the workings of this system, and not become victims of it. They need to take responsibility for their health and take care of themselves. Our lifestyles create over 50% of our problems in the first place.
So, as we look over the landscape of health care reform, we’re going to focus on doing what is right for the individual. We’ll continue in our efforts to “educate the consumer” and help organizations create the “trust” that is going to be needed to connect with the individual.
Health is personal- Eat right, exercise, get plenty of rest, and keep the stress down; It’s not difficult. Creating the social context around these ideas to engage the individual is the challenge. And, health plans and the government aren’t the right messengers right now.
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