Patients' Costs Skyrocket; Specialists' Incomes Soar

We've been introduced to the rise of health care costs in our past lectures, and in the movie Escape Fire. In a New York Times article, Patients Costs Skyrocket;Specialists' Incomes Soar, the author focuses on the astronomical increase of the cost of specialists in comparison to their primary care physician counterparts. There are certain specialists that are the top earners of any other physician in the field, these include orthopedics, cardiology, anesthesiology, radiology, dermatology, plastic surgery, urology, gastroenterology, and ophthalmology. These physicians earn more than $350,000 annually, according to American Medical Group Association. In some cases, certain specialists incomes have risen more than 10% since 2011 (Medscape). For dermatologists, gastroenterologists and oncologists, their incomes have risen 50% or more between 1995 and 2012. These prices are protected by the more than 750 lobbyists in Washington, as they push back on any efforts to limit the doctors' incomes. Primary care doctors on the other hand have only about 5 representatives who are often struggling to make ends meet without the extra cash from side surgeries/x-rays/etc. The incomes for primary care doctors only rose 10% in that same 17 year period.

The article talks of Ms. Little from Arkansas who felt she was bullied into seeing 3 different specialists for the removal of a small white mole on her cheek using the Mohs surgery (an effective way of removing carcinogenic moles but not needed more several cases). She started in with the dermatologist who removed the mole. Then, he sent her across the street to see the plastic surgeon who would close the wound with a "couple of stitches". Yet when she arrived, she was greeting by nurses who prepared her to see an anesthesiologist to sedate her as well. According to the article, "the vast majority of Mohs procedure are sewed up by the dermatologist or just bandages and left to heal." Her bills totaled more than $25,000.

It's alarming to me that many patients out there don't feel as if they can get in a say in what kind of treatments they receive. We are taught to trust doctors because of their extensive training in the medical field, and we think to trust specialists even more for their dedication to a specific trade. However, reading Ms. Little's story makes me think otherwise. My mom actually had Mohs surgery a few years ago for a spot on her nose, and she informed me that she only saw the dermatologist who diagnosed the spot and then was sent to just one Mohs specialist who did everything else. No plastic surgeon, and no anesthesiologist. This just shows the varying types of treatment people face all over the country. Now I don't know how much my mom paid before insurance because she also worked for the hospital at the time so her rates I believe were a bit discounted. Unfortunately, as the article mentioned, incomes are only going to increase over the years. So I wonder what we really can do to stop these inflated prices for certain treatments?