Are you struggling to make ends meet? Prices are rapidly increasing and wages are not keeping pace. The problem is especially acute in health care. One dollar out of every five in the United States is spent on health care. In Europe, it is one dollar out of ten. In Singapore, it is one dollar out of twenty and people in that country live longer. Fewer women die in childbirth in Europe and Singapore. Infant death is less common there. We pay more and get less. It is a fact.
The reasons for the difference are clear. Europe and Singapore have health systems built on primary care and their approach is much more up to date. Primary care is focused on the whole person. Our system is built around organ systems and specialists. An older person with multiple chronic diseases may see 6 or 8 specialists. That is much less common in these other countries. They are using primary care clinics and teams designed around chronic illnesses.
Chronic diseases account for almost nine dollars out of ten spent on healthcare in the United States. Heart diseases and related conditions are the low hanging fruit. Scientific advances tell us that relatively easy diet, exercise, and medical management—optimal medical therapy (OMT)— reduces death after a heart attack by 90% over 5 years. OMT first—before bypasses and stents— delivered by primary care is the way the British system functions. In our country, OMT first is the standard of care by American College of Cardiology guidelines, but our heart care in our country is still build around bypasses, stents, and opening blockages. There is a blueprint from the best medical people in the country to guide the revolution and it has been around for twenty years. We can have better health at lower cost, but we must change the system to more effectively address chronic diseases.
Because we have not done that, we are still have the highest healthcare costs and we are not getting the value for all that money. Americans who have a heart attack have stents and bypasses at much higher rates than patients in other countries, but they don’t get OMT. As a consequence, death rates in America thirty days after a heart attack and a year after a heart attack are much higher than they are in England and the Netherlands. Despite a mountain of scientific evidence supporting OMT and the American College of Cardiology calling for it to be used first, very few Americans know about it. It is not being taught in our medical and nursing schools and it is not available in most communities. Many healthcare professionals are not aware of it.
Why? Because like our other institutions, American medicine is not serving the American people as it should. Why? Because change is a threat to the special interests with the money and power who are winning in the current system. Failure to change is a dire threat to everyone else and our national security. I can’t find more gasoline or cheaper food, but I promise you, we can have better health at lower cost and that would make a big difference. But you can’t have it by sitting on your hands. This is a call to peaceful revolution that begins with your spreading the word about OMT. Tell your friends and family about this site. Pay $7 a month for a subscription so I can get some help. Tell your doctor she can get CME credit here. Ask your community or medical group to make OMT available. A social media revolution can work! Let’s get started! Spread the word about OMT!
Hey Doc, such an important message! I need to resubscribe, my card # changed & I’m recreating all the auto-debits.
ANYWAY I only have 70 followers on twitter, but I did a post tweeting out this article 🙌🏻
https://twitter.com/mkalayjian/status/1554460069202362368?s=20&t=OYGzwDuoKPS0QWFGXlsLdA