Framework for Thinking about Healthcare: Access, Quality, Cost
July 16, 2009 – 6:40 am by DrEricAnytime you read an article about healthcare or hear a news story about healthcare, think about it in terms of how it will affect (1) Access, (2) Quality and (3) Cost. Healthcare is a 3-legged stool and these are the legs.
When you are deciding for yourself if a change to healthcare is for the better or worse, think about how it will affect Access, Quality and Cost.
Do the changes proposed by Washington increase Access to care for everyone? Do they may make Access more limited for certain groups or locations?
Do the changes improve Quality? In what ways do they make Quality worse?
Do the changes lower the Cost of healthcare? Do they lower the Cost for some while raising the Cost for others? Do they lower the overall Cost for everyone?
I will leave it up to you to answer these questions for yourself, but thinking about Access, Quality and Cost may give you some structure to the often-times confusing and disorganized debate.
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