Newt Gingrich Urges More Modernization of Health Care

New York Times Syndicate/Good Housekeeping ^ | August 13, 2003 | Bob Dart

[GraniteStateConservative]

Newt Gingrich urged Congress on Tuesday to use negotiations over a Medicare prescription drug benefit as a step toward transforming the nation's entire health care system.

Since a federal plan to help seniors pay for prescription drugs is ``the largest single domestic program change since Lyndon Johnson's 'Great Society' of 1965,'' the former House Speaker said, ``anything less than this effort will lead to a politically and financially unsustainable outcome.''

With Congress in recess, House and Senate staffers are hammering out differences in versions of the Medicare prescription benefit. President Bush has urged Congress to pass such a measure and the Republican leaders of Congress would like to complete the legislation before the next election year.

Gingrich, a Republican from Georgia, led a symposium at the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative think tank on ``transforming'' rather than ``reforming'' Medicare. Gingrich, a senior fellow at the institute, co-authored a book entitled ``Saving Lives & Saving Money'' that deals with his vision of modernizing health care.

Medicare recipients must be given the option of staying in the current system and adding a prescription drug benefit, Gingrich said. Rather than coercing them into leaving the system as they know it, there should be enough incentive that they'll want to leave.

Both plans would provide prescription drug benefits costing about $400 billion over 10 years, with the option to remain in the present Medicare system if patients so choose. The House bill, unlike the Senate's, would in 2010 create a system requiring the traditional program to compete with private health plans based on price.

Gingrich said the right bill can create a Medicare system that is less expensive than projections by the Congressional Budget Office while allowing seniors to stay in the 1965 designed system if they choose.

House and Senate conferees should view the Senate and House bills ``as building blocks rather than boundaries,'' Gingrich said.

To do that, Medicare must embrace 21st Century technology, information systems and health care programs, he said.

He cited a computerized system that allows a senior's pharmacist and doctors to know all the drugs the recipient is taking. Such systems usually reduce the total medications and prevent often dangerous interactions between drugs, he said. Likewise, having doctors e-mail in prescriptions reduces errors and easily feeds into a centralized data bank on each patient.

Some privacy advocates have expressed concern over such efforts to pull together electronic databases of patient care, fearing the information could be misappropriated by outside entities. Gingrich did not address privacy concerns.

He compared a recently enacted Florida law mandating that every doctor's prescription order ``be legibly written'' with a Tufts University insurance plan that issued free BlackBerrys to the 5,000 doctors in its network, thus providing wireless e-prescribing.

``The contrast between the 20th Century of health care delivery and the 21st is very blatant in these approaches,'' he said.

If airlines can quickly convert to electronic ticketing, hospitals can quickly convert to electronic admissions, Gingrich said. A key to transforming the entire health care system is to transform Medicare -- ``since Medicare is the largest single payer.''

He also cited a Georgia-based company called Evercare, which specializes in care for the least healthy senior citizens in long term care facilities, based on statistics that show that a very small percentage of Medicare recipients create half of its expenses.

He said the company puts the patient's entire medical and drug record in a lap-top and has a nurse practitioner responsible for that patient's care and medications.

``The average patient is reduced from 22 drugs a day to six,'' said Gingrich. ``The result is fewer medication complications and a 50 percent reduction in hospitalization.''

[xrp]

`The average patient is reduced from 22 drugs a day to six,'' said Gingrich.

Ugh...what is with old people and drugs? I wonder how many of these illnesses are made up like adult ADD/ADHD and child ADD/ADHD???

22 drugs a DAY??? Sheez...Now, I'm only 30, but right now I only take my daily Centrum vitamin and I rarely even take drugs whenever I am ill. I prefer to let my body respond to it and develop a stronger immunity.

About the only drug I've taken in the past 3 years is the rare aspirin (1 every 3months, I almost never get headaches) and a couple of claritan in the spring when everything was blooming and my allergies started going bonkers.

[goodnesswins]

OK....I'm about 22 years older than you, and I don't take ANY drugs, except tylenol/aspirin.....last time I took a prescription was about 7 years ago for terrible sinus infections and headaches, and then $11,000 in surgery...which didn't work, then to a Naturapath....who SOLVED the problem....but, I know a number of those in my age group or older who would rather take drugs than exercise or change their eating habits.....("I can't give up bread" or "He won't stop eating sugar.")

[Ursus arctos horribilis]

I am retired, through my former company the wife and I have excellent affordable prescription drug insurance.

My biggest fear is, if the Medicare prescription drug plan is made for universal coverage, then our insurance will be cancelled by aforemention company. Universal Medicare prescription drug coverage will give them and many other companies the chance to bail, and they will.

[billb]

I saw Newt addressing this on C-SPAN Friday. It was great, filled with common sense changes and practical approaches, unfortunately those are the two things which will keep it from being implemented. I think I saw that it was on C-SPAN again just a little while ago.

[GOP_Lady]

Yes, I saw it a short time ago on C-SPAN. As usual, Newt was an excellent instructor/teacher.

[Ursus arctos horribilis]

And your point is? That you are not old yet, let me know at three score plus how it goes.

At age 54 I had a body and health most thirty year old males only can dream of. Ten years later at 64, I am damn near a basket case.

Neither your case or mine is typical, but believe me, $hit happens.

[GOP_Lady]

I'm glad you don't have to take prescriptions. I take 4 drugs per day that I have to take, and NO diet or exercise could change that.

[goodnesswins]

I agree with you....that is our big fear also.....that the gov't will make it NOT WORTH COMPANIES carrying medical coverage for retirees.....GET THE GOVERNMENT OUT OF HEALTHCARE!!!

[goodnesswins]

I'm sorry that you do....and I was NOT addressing those who do NOT have a WAY to ALLEVIATE some of their problems....please understand that....BUT, those that COULD alleviate some or all of their problems are putting UNDUE burdens on the SYSTEM, i.e. your needs.

[Libertarianize the GOP]

http://www.freerepublic.com/perl/bump-list

[alrea]

GET THE GOVERNMENT OUT OF HEALTHCARE!!!

Folks they know they have us where they want us. Government care has always led to inefficiences that lead to more government intervention.

Dr. Dean knows full well the leftward direction will be good timing soon. HR Clinton is counting on it as well.

People are screaming for free health stuff.

Little by little the Euro-socialist approach is seeping into the system, like a drug.

[jd777]

Is it me or are the drug companies themselves using their muscle to push us into socialism?

[adamyoshida]

Am I the only one here who thinks that Newt is preparing for a run- perhaps in '08?

I remember when he left the Speakership. The first thing I said was, "that's not the last we'll see of him."

[tob2]

There is no such thing as adult onset ADD/ADHD. A person develops that in infancy. For some persons, the symptoms do not development until adulthood. The same thing with scoliosis. A person also develops that in infancy but the condition may not show up until adulthood.

[xrp]

More appropriately, there is no such thing as ADD/ADHD period.

[luckydevi]

I miss Newt

[hocndoc]

Bingo!
In my meaner moments, I remind my diabetic patients that (except for the rare insulin dependent/Type 1 AKA Juvenile onset Diabetic) they don't have to eat because they take their diabetes medicine. They have to take the medicine because of what they eat!

When we hospitalize type2 diabetics, we often have to be careful, because when we put them on a hospital diet, with a set calorie amount, their home medication may be too much.

[hocndoc]

thanks for the ping

[OESY]

Me too. Newt was a clear thinker and well informed on almost every issue -- unfortunately, sometimes out loud, in public. His videotapes were not partisan, as he went out of his way to laud FDR and other key historical figures. Nevertheless, Special Counsel James Cole (Deputy Attorney General under Reno) found he had used the tapes for "party-building" -- like Democrats use professors for party-building. All tax charges against him were dismissed. Newt fell when House Republicans failed to stand behind him.