Thinking Citizen Blog — Insanity, Exasperation, Lamentation (Part II) — Bureaucracy, Technology, and the Hippocratic Oath

Thinking Citizen Blog — Thursday is Health, Health Care, and Global Health Policy Day

Today’s Topic: Insanity, Exasperation, Lamentation (Part II) — Bureaucracy, Technology, and the Hippocratic Oath

It’s worse than I thought. Last week I began the account of the utter failure of communication between what is reputed to be the best hospital on the West Coast with what is allegedly one of the best hospitals on the East Coast. Yesterday, I went to see my primary care physician in Concord, Massachusetts only to experience another mind-blowing surprise: her using my cell phone rather than her office computer to access my health care records! The story: security concerns are drastically reducing the efficiency of communication between health care professionals. Failure of communication of this sort is a euphemism. It is a recipe for medical error of the sort that can lead to death and disability. The question today is: who is responsible for this insanity? Where does the buck stop? Who decides what level of security (or “privacy”) concern warrants compromising the efficiency of the communication of vital information among health care decision maker? Experts — please chime in. Correct, elaborate, elucidate.

YOU CAN’T BLAME THE DOCTORS, AND NURSES, AND OTHER ATTENDANTS

1. “Security” and “Privacy” are not their speciality.

2. Not their responsibility.

3. They are overworked as it is.

CAN YOU BLAME THE GENERAL CORPORATE MANAGERS?

1. But they are so busy.

2. They have so much else to do.

3. And what do they know about technology anyway?

CAN YOU BLAME THE CHIEF TECHNOLOGY OFFICERS? OR THE BIG TECH COMPANIES?

1. But what do they know about health care?

2. Patient care is not their responsibility.

CAN YOU BLAME POLITICAL AUTHORITIES AT THE STATE OR NATIONAL LEVEL?

1. Are the regulators asleep at the switch?

2. How about the legislators?

3. How about the Governors? the President?

CONCLUSION

1.) What can be done?

2.) Is this problem peculiar to the US?

3.) Any related experiences to share?

For the last four years of posts organized by theme:

PDF with headlines — Google Drive

ATTACHMENTS BELOW -

#1 A graphic guide to justice (9 metaphors on one page).

#2 “39 Songs, Prayers, and Poems: the Keys to the Hearts of Seven Billion People” — Adams House Senior Common Room Presentation, 11/17/20

YOUR TURN

Please share the most interesting thing you learned in the last week related to health, health care or health care policy — the ethics, economics, politics, history…. Or the coolest, most important thing you learned in your life related to health are or health care policy that the rest of us may have missed. Or just some random health-related fact that blew you away.

This is your chance to make some one’s day. Or to cement in your mind something really important you might otherwise forget. Or to think more deeply than you otherwise would about something that matters.