Managing Editor
As opposition continues to the national health-care reform bill signed in March, medical professionals are trying to prepare for the eventual outcomes.
Dr. William Rupp, chief executive officer of Mayo Clinic Florida, will share his views Tuesday with the World Affairs Council Jacksonville and The Gate Governors Club.
“Nothing about this is going to be easy. If it were easy, we would have done it a long time ago,” Rupp said last week during an interview with the Daily Record.
Rupp’s presentation, called “The Progress Made in Health-Care Reform and the Challenges that Lie Ahead,” is scheduled for noon at The River Club.
In brief, the sweeping legislation calls for most Americans to have health-care coverage, which has raised concerns and opposition about costs, choice and other elements of the extensive reform.
Rupp said last week that he will try to share what the reform will mean to patients, employers and physicians.
“A lot of the rules and regulations will be formed over future years, so they’re not real clear yet, No. 1,” said Rupp.
“No. 2, this is landmark legislation. The world has changed now and it is not going back. It will require that we all change,” he said.
Rupp said the legislation will require that physicians work together, that patients take accountability for their own health, that the health-care industry becomes more efficient and that government change the way it pays for care.
Asked whether the population had a clue what would happen, Rupp said: “I don’t think we do. I think it’s going to be a lot bigger than most people understand.”
Rupp said the current health-care system is based on payment for treating sick people and not based on paying to keep the population well.
“There are some attempts for paying for outcomes rather than procedures. There are going to be attempts at accountable health care, at paying for taking care of the population,” said Rupp.
He said patterns have been ingrained.
“We have social patterns ingrained in patients. We have financial patterns ingrained in insurance companies and doctors and hospitals. We have a lot of patterns that will have to be changed,” he said.
Rupp said the legislation will take effect in stages over five to seven years, but he also believes it could take 10 to 20 years for reform.
“It’s going to take awhile.”
He said 32 million to 40 million people in the country are uninsured, perhaps more, depending on the source of the information.
“I don’t care which number you pick, it’s way too many,” he said.
Rupp predicts more pressure on prevention and patients’ involvement in their care.
“For a long time, the attitude in this country has been, ‘I will do whatever I want until I break and then you guys will fix me and I will go back to doing whatever I want.’ That is going to change,” he said.
Employers are already providing health-cost discounts for employees who don’t smoke or who take preventative measures for good health.
Rupp also predicts that those paying for health care – employers, insurance companies and patients – will pay for value and outcomes in treatment, “not just for doing tests.”
“I hope with the increased coverage that we see people able to get care earlier and therefore manage chronic disease or prevent chronic disease,” said Rupp.
Rupp said the Mayo Clinic system has been preparing for the reform by asking: “How can we come up with new models of care? How can we deliver more care to people at a lesser unit cost? How can we take out waste in the system?”
Hospitals and clinics need to work at ridding themselves of health-care acquired infections and making sure they work together to rapidly diagnose a patient’s problems and put patients on the appropriate treatment and routine, he said.
“Whether we can do this fast enough, I don’t know,” he said.
At the same time, the reform needs to assure that everyone is covered, “and if it doesn’t, this will be a problem.”
As for costs, “it has to be more expensive to not being insured than being insured.”
Rupp said reform includes “some positive first steps.”
“Paying for value is a positive first step. Trying to get everybody insured is a positive first step,” he said.
He also has some concerns.
“I am anxious about the time frame not being fast enough. I, like many people, am concerned what this overall is going to cost, and I don’t think many of us know.“
While there are pros and cons, “this is a new world and we need to go forward to it.”
For more information about the luncheon program, visit www.worldaffairscounciljax.org
356-2466