You have seen the news clips of rowdy town hall sessions around the country. You have been bombarded with advertisements supporting one or another side of the healthcare reform issues or another. You have seen pundits and heard debates on cable news about healthcare. Yet, you still are not really clear on what the issues are or where you stand on them. You wish someone would have a real conversation about healthcare reform that does not leave your head spinning, but instead gives you real, concrete things to think about. Health Watch is attempting to do its part to help weed through the rhetoric and get to the heart of understanding healthcare reform.
Health Watch hosted two recent shows focused on different aspects of the healthcare reform issue. Last week we spoke with Dr. Alfredo Cambronero, an economics professor at Fisk University about the costs of healthcare reform. He told us about how most Americans are covered under employer-based insurance coverage, which in large part is already subsidized by the government. We talked about the pros and cons of a “public option,” an approach to regulating insurance costs by providing government-run health insurance as an option for employers and citizens. Dr. Cambronero offered additional insight about what our current healthcare debate and the divisiveness it has caused says about us as a nation and what we truly value. It was a discussion you would not have wanted to miss.
Last night, Health Watch spoke with Dr. Dale Block, a family practitioner, healthcare management expert and author of the book, Healthcare Stewardship: a Guide to Improving the Health of All Americans. He has developed an 8-point plan for changing the current United States “sick-care” into a “well-care” system. The idea of “stewardship,” each of us taking responsibility for health is at the core of his plan.
Prevention is another essential part of “health stewardship” as Dr. Block sees it. He believes whole-heartedly in people promoting better health by educating themselves and each other about health and doing those things in our power to promote health. He also believes that evidence-based medicine, identifying medical practices that work and eliminating those that do not, is critical to improving quality and efficiency in care. Dr. Block is not just advocating health stewardship as a solution to healthcare reform he is putting it into practice in a rural Florida community. Dr. Cambronero is doing the same through his research and applied economic endeavors here and abroad. When it comes to thinking about healthcare reform, Drs. Cambronero and Block are not just talking the talk. They are walking the walk.
If you want to find out more about Dr. Block’s ideas about healthcare reform and his book, you can check out this link: http://www.healthcarestewardship.com/
During the upcoming weeks we invite our Health Watch listeners and blog readers to join our conversation about healthcare reform. We will keep bringing you the best and brightest minds on the issue and wade through the myths to get to the heart of what really matters, figuring out how to provide quality care for all of us. Until next time remember, “When we know better, we should do better. So pass it on!”
