Many recent articles have suggested that Massachusetts’ healthcare reform should be the model for universal healthcare for the rest of the nation. I wholeheartedly disagree with this. The problem is much more extensive than just providing coverage to the uninsured.
Everyone wants to claim success for Massachusetts having "the country’s lowest percentage of the uninsured - 2.6 percent, compared with a national average of 15 percent," yet there’s truly no success to claim. In western Mass., for example, while that same low number of uninsured holds true, the fact remains that 20 percent of the population is unable to access proper care. That is, the increased demand for care from the newly insured confronted an insufficient supply of physicians. "One in five adults said they had been told in the last 12 months that a doctor or clinic was not accepting new patients or would not see patients with their type of insurance.” Thus, the problem isn’t the lack of insurance coverage; it’s the lack of access to care.
It's the same ol’ story: there's a shortage of primary care physicians which results in a flood to our ERs for non-emergency treatment. We’ve struggled through this for the past 20 or 30 years. When I say that improvements will not occur in healthcare reform, I’m not being a cynic; I’m being a realist.
There still isn’t enough money to incentivize physicians to enter - and stay - in primary care. Given our current economy, we now have the added pressure of reduced state revenues resulting in state cutbacks in healthcare reimbursements, further exacerbating the issue. To me, it’s just lip service to correct the problem of the uninsured when more fundamental problems exist.
Is Massachusetts an exemplary solution to healthcare reform? Absolutely not. Until we solve the problem of primary care access and how it is delivered, we’re just spinning our wheels. Providing health coverage to the uninsured doesn’t hold much water if folks are unable to obtain quality care.
After all, if we can’t correctly fix one state’s healthcare system, how will we be able to fix it for all 50?