Physicians Needed for Health Care Transformation

Yesterday, MDNews.com, an emerging online news network for physicians, posted an edited version of my "Peer Perspective" submission on its website. Here is the full text:

"As new health care reform laws drive us away from focusing on volume and more toward achieving greater value, physicians will have renewed opportunity to practice medicine as a science and art. Your expertise will be vital to setting and achieving higher standards of care and in squeezing out redundant or unnecessary costs. Focusing on volume has robbed physicians and their patients of the time it takes to provide comprehensive, consistent care. Focusing on quality has the promise of restoring more effective and fulfilling practice — if physicians embrace change and champion the role as leaders of transformation. It's easy to dismiss standardization, checklists and other quality and patient safety initiatives as an affront to freedom. In reality, they may actually serve to support physicians by removing risk and enabling you to excel as you apply your considerable talents and experience with an enhanced emphasis on achieving optimal outcomes."

My hope is that physicians will rise up, cast off the chains of bureaucracy that have bound them, and lead us to new age of medicine.

— Tom DeSanto

Image: MDNews.com Website