For Medicare, the repayment and regulation of trees remotely around the box on the road-more temporary extensions of flexibility in the Covid era. The current exile on September 30.
It is April 2025 and healthcare is still awaiting a permanent solution from the government to get a distance and medicare – which tends to pay what medicaid insurance companies and private insurance companies are doing. Will you find October 1 that the industry is with a permanent solution or another kick from the box on the road?
Dr. Ateev Mehrotra is the head of the Department of Health Services, Politics and practice at the College of Public Health at the University of Brown. He is an expert in remote medication policy. Health care news He sat with him to discuss widely about the future of payment and remote organization.
Q: September 30 is the new deadline for further stabs from a distance medicine. Where do things stand, and what do you think about how this will be shaken?
A. I often struggle to answer this question. On the one hand, it is a very easy answer. There is wide support from Enehealth, and it is very difficult for me to find anyone who objects to a permanent expansion. In essence, the advantages of health care are not remotely, although there are some nuances, but they are very simple, but generally people are excited. It really comes to money.
Expanding access to health care from a distance will take money. Where does this money come from? To use the language within Beltway, where is payment against? This is really a conversation. It is easier to pass the short -term extensions because you do not need to find more fundamental payment payments. Therefore, in some respects, it seems easy because everyone loves this thing. Let’s continue.
On the other hand, what will you do to pay for it? This is where the real controversy is, especially in the context of the Republican side, which tries to pass large tax discounts, and it is very expensive. Therefore, it is not easy to find how to pay for it. Anything that will increase health care or medical care spending is difficult. This is where we stand now.
Q: What will be the implications if the flexibility is stopped? September 30 comes side by side, and Congress does not pass anything. Or, what are the effects of the flexibility on the road again?
A. If they stop, this will be completely destroyed for some patients who depend on health care, either due to their life conditions, the difficulty of traveling, and the distance to see their doctors – and will reduce the continuity of care in this context. For doctors who used to provide this care.
Let’s be very clear: the ordinary and medium American doctor, while they see the strengths and weaknesses of health care, You want to be present and be available. There will be a lot of angry Americans.
What are the effects if we kick the box on the road again? These short -term extensions undermine remote distance, although they are extended. What do I mean?
You manage heart disease in Illinois, and you have a patient in front of you today, and they say, “Hey, DOC, I want to set the date for my follow -up within six months. Can we do this through a distance health care?” You are now in a situation. You are like, “I don’t know. Will Congress do that? Do I have to do that? No, let’s visit a personal.”
You are undermining there. You run a large health system or practice. Should we invest in health care? I don’t know. What will Congress do? Let’s not invest in health care. Should we open a center in order to be able to remove a distance? not yet. We don’t know What will do Congress.
The continuous extensions in the short term, in essence, undermine what everyone wants to happen, which is a distance health care. This is the real fear that I have, because it is not like a health care system that can operate ten cents.
The date of these appointments has been set for the month of October. You know what it is. I know what is like getting a date for follow -up. You should schedule things six, seven or eight months. To date, uncertainty is the problem.
Q: You say, “temporary interventions suffocate innovation.” Can you talk about it a little?
A. If we want health care to be combined with routine care, there must be changes in the place where health systems are invested, how doctors build their weekly schedules, how the schedule system works, the program we use, and contracts with electronic health records to implement and support health care away.
All of these things require investment and organization. Currently, no one is ready to do this, or there is a lower investment because of it. I would also like to say that it suffocates innovation in the private field. There are a lot of really interesting ideas for how to make health care better.
Be more realistic, when you ask the ordinary American, “What do you think of health care?” They are like, “Yes, it’s really suitable. It’s really great. But I don’t know the physical exam. I am not sure that I get the same care that I will get if I go personally.”
Some companies there say: “Well, what if we change that?
Suddenly, I can add that critical data that the doctor may need to try to develop the best diagnosis and treatment plan. If you are one of those companies at the moment when you invest in these devices, you are trying to get VC financing. But people like, “I don’t know. Do you have legs, comrades?”
Not now, because perhaps in October, Congress will not carry out permanent healthcare extensions. Suddenly, this huge space of people will not be able to use health care remotely, so the market size decreased.
These companies are fighting now. This is just another example of the place where we suffocate innovation through these short -term extensions. People need to know the shape of the natural scene to make the investments they see appropriate.
Q: What is in your mind, solve this challenge? Do you think that the solution has a reasonable opportunity to successfully implement?
A. At the end of the day, I think it is easy: just take the word “temporary” and make it “permanent” and let us move with life. There are some nuances for that. It has called for the actual payment of health care visits to a little less than personal visits. In this way, the payment is a little less, so it is more sustainable.
But this is a slight difference instead of a big issue. Do I think it has a reasonable opportunity to implement it? When we talk about the problems of the big image we face at the present time, in terms of medical discounts and tax discounts, all of these issues are increasing, this expansion of distance health care and payment for a dollar, it is a small dollar.
In this sense, given the support of the two parties, in addition to the lack of a lot of money, I hope we will reach this solution and we will move from the conversation about whether health care is far here to stay. Then we will move more towards, “How do we make health care better?”
Because there is a lot of work to do, still. How do we ensure that everyone can access health care? How do we make sure that they are in rural areas? How can we improve the quality of health care visits? There is a lot of work to do, but we continue to push it on the road, and I would like to start focusing on these questions now.
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