Haven't had time to weigh in on this thread much but to give Gruss a quick answer about "which Medicare" the answer is Medicare as a whole program. I imagine that the administrative overhead varies between plan parts but as an overall program, its overhead costs run pretty low. Since Medicare is an insurance program, administrative costs are roughly defined as the percentage of overall budget taken up by money that isn't going to payments. At a quick google, here is an article that shows a paper taking the "low administrative costs" of medicare to task and saying they are higher than at first seemed and then a response to that assertion. The figures I've generally seen range from an administrative overhead of 2 to 8 percent for Medicare and 15 to 30 percent for private insurance. http://www.pnhp.org/news/2006/january/cahis_claim_of_medi.php
As for IT in healthcare, well, that's coming. That is my area of expertise and employment currently. I write software to make medical billing and administration more efficient and the company I work for does data interchange between medical systems. There are a whole lot of gotchas out there and the medical world is inherently a bit on the conservative side. But things are coming along. If anyone ever wants help sorting out the mishmash of acronyms like CCHIT, HITSP, CDA, CCR, CCD, HL7, RIMMBA, HIE, IHE, RHIO, etc then I'll help out and make your head hurt. You'll have to buy me a beer though. Judah On Mon, Feb 16, 2009 at 9:09 AM, Cameron Childress <[email protected]> wrote: > > On Mon, Feb 16, 2009 at 12:03 PM, Gruss Gott <[email protected]> wrote: >> But if we really want to take cost out of the system we need to lower >> admin costs and that can only be done through standardization and >> automation. > > Agreed - big time. Medical systems are painfully disconnected from an > IT standpoint. Both from a billing/administrative standpoint and > medical records standpoint. > > IRS isn't too far behind, though they are improving in little itsy > bitsy baby steps. > > -Cameron > > ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Adobe® ColdFusion® 8 software 8 is the most important and dramatic release to date Get the Free Trial http://ad.doubleclick.net/clk;207172674;29440083;f Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/message.cfm/messageid:288659 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=11502.10531.5
