Trump administration has stated that the burden such programs have placed on the doctors and medical practices has resulted in provider-hospital consolidation that lessens competition and increases prices. The recently released Economic Report of the President by the White House has contended that meaningful use and quality metrics reporting has overly burdened independent and small practices.
The report says that small medical practices and solo physicians who struggle to pay for just an electronic health record system in order to comply with US government’s reporting requirements have found themselves in such a heavy strain that they have started selling themselves out to hospitals. This resulting consolidation had actually raised healthcare costs for patients.
The administration has also blamed the Affordable Care Act for the mandated cuts in large practices payments. It notes that the regulatory burdens have made it really difficult for solo practitioners and small healthcare institutions to operate alone.
“Hospital mergers are booming, leading to horizontal integration, and large hospitals are buying up physicians’ practices and outpatient service providers to form large, vertically integrated healthcare networks,” the report said.
The decisions regarding the encumbrance on solo practitioners and small physician groups almost mirror the ones that were published in the Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association back in Jan 2017.
Trump’s health report further foretold another study, due later in 2018, in which policies will be identified, at both state levels and federal levels that are really fueling price increases and hospital consolidation.
“Hospital competition leads to lower prices and higher quality,” the Trump report said. “This is consistent with the Administration’s deregulatory agenda, which has already withdrawn, made inactive, and delayed hundreds of economically destructive regulations.”
What the future holds, still remains to be seen but this is what has been reported so far. Stay tuned for further reports on US healthcare.
