Infographic from MBA Healthcare Management provides a deep look into how the United States healthcare system is broken falling short of other industrial countries.
- Source: .MBA Healthcare Management
5 Ways Our Healthcare System Is Broken
1. We Spend Way Too Much on Nothing
– Nearly 1/3 of healthcare spending is wasted
– IMO estimates America loses $750 billion annually on (adjusting for some overlap among categories)
– unnecessary services ($210b – 27.5%)
– inefficient delivery of care ($130b – 17%)
– excess admin costs ($190b – 24.8%)
– inflated prices ($105b – 13.7%)
– prevention failures ($55b – 7.2%)
– fraud ($75 – 9.8%)
– The Defense Dept budgeted $757.8 billion for the Iraq war over 8 years)
– US healthcare prices have grown at double the rate of overall inflation in the past century
– Government deficits are driven almost entirely by healthcare costs
– US healthcare cost per capita is exponentially higher than in other industrialized countries
2. We Don’t Pay Doctors According to the Quality of Care Given
– Percentage of doctors who are paid, in part, according to quality of care
– UK – 95%
– Australia – 72%
– US – 30%
– EMR (electronic medical records) increase quality of care and lower costs
– Percentages of EMR penetration
– UK – 89%
– Australia – 79%
– Netherlands – 98%
– US – 28%
3. Many of Us Aren’t Getting Care at All
– 25% of the US cannot afford to see a doctor
– 23% skipped a recommended test, treatment or follow-up
– 23% didn’t fill prescriptions
– No other countries is close to this income-based rationing
– Canada – only 5% skipped care
– UK – only 2 or 3% skipped care
– 19% of Americans are unable or have serious problems paying medical bills
– no other country is even in the double digits
– Our care is also inconvenient
– Only 30% of Americans report having access to a doctor on the day they need one
– Britons – 41%
– Germans 55%
– Australians – 67%
4. We do Not Treat Chronic Conditions Properly
– Americans have the highest rate of chronic disease (next to Australians)
– One of the biggest issues with chronic disease is coordination of care
– A single “medical home” is imperative for those with chronic illness (ex. diabetes, kidney failure)
– It is critical for providers to have a full picture of
– medical history
– treatments received
– therapies
– We tie with Canadians for the lowest percentage reporting a single “medical home”
– 42% of Americans report paying over $500 out-of-pocket on prescriptions annually
– Higher costs means more people going without medication
– Less medication means less maintenance for chronic illness
– Les maintenance means catastrophic health events
– That same 42% are skipping care, drug doses and doctor’s appointments due to cost
5. We are Frequent Victims of Medical, Medication and Lab Errors
– 20% of Americans admit to experiencing malpractice in one year
– the rate is higher for those with chronic illness
– About 75K deaths/year might be prevented if the best care available was the standard
– 18% of hospital patients suffer injury during the course of their care (according to study by Harvard Medical School)
– The US Dept of Health found:
– 1 in 7 Medicare patients suffer injuries during hospital stays
– Adverse events during medical care contributes to 180k deaths/year
– Up to 40 wrong site, wrong side, wrong patients procedures happen weekly in the US
– Medical malpractice causes 9x as many deaths annually as guns do
