Our healthcare system is designed to rescue patients very late in the chronic disease process. It is like they have been on the river of chronic illness for a couple of decades, but we send in a rescue helicopter just before they go over the falls, to experience devastating injury or death. The rescue helicopter is dramatic, and the rescue swimmer is heroic. It is great public relations, but it is an ineffective and expensive way of dealing with chronic illness. We can identify people who are headed for the falls far upstream. That is the path to staying healthier and independent longer at lower cost.
This system is firmly entrenched because sending out a rescue helicopter costs more money. You can make a lot of money in the rescue helicopter business. Helping someone out of the river upstream is very inexpensive. You can make a ton of money with rescue helicopters, but you can’t make very much throwing a rescue ring on a rope to just help them get out— no drama, no heroes, not much money. The people who determine the priorities in our health system answer to stockholders and executives. It is run by businessmen. It is about making money. It is not about helping you stay healthy. Our rescue helicopter business works great for stockholders and executives. It fails for everyone else.
It is the same with all chronic illnesses, but I write about heart disease and related conditions like diabetes. Those are the diseases where we can identify people with higher risk very far upstream and our tools are very precise. We don’t need to throw the ring to the person starting the float trip to the falls over and over. We can protect them with great precision. Our current healthcare system is designed around organ systems and specialists, and we depend on cardiologists to open large arteries that are 70% blocked. We call that treating disease and we call treat everything else prevention. As I have explained since January 17th, 2024 in this space, that is a wholly inadequate way of looking at artery disease.
When we wait to get serious until the patient has blocked arteries in the heart or is about to have a heart attack or die, that is very expensive, and we are very good at it. When your local health system talks about their great heart health system, that is what they are talking about. When they tell you that a person having a heart attack can get a lifesaving stent within an hour of arrival in the emergency room, that is great for those patients. They are not having a heart attack because of a chronic blockage. They are having a heart attack because of an acute blockage with a clot that started because of a cholesterol deposit. Opening the artery when you are having a heart attack saves lives and heart muscle. OMT keeps you from developing those acute clots nearly as often. It stabilizes cholesterol plaques so that they don’t rupture and cause clots.
The earlier you start OMT, the more normal your arteries will be. OMT is not prevention. It is the best treatment for artery disease. So the big question is: When can we first identify the people who will develop vascular disease? We can identify them very early. We need to start by identifying people who have disease. Here is the definition of disease. Disease is “a disorder of structure or function in a human, animal, or plant, especially one that has a known cause and a distinctive group of symptoms, signs, or anatomical changes.”
When we go way upstream, we are not providing preventive services. We are treating disease more effectively. We are throwing a life ring on a rope to people who are headed for the falls. If you are overeating and have extra belly fat, you already have disease. You are making hormones in the belly fat that increase oxidant production, inflammation, thicken the artery, and inhibit artery expansion and increased flow during exercise. If you have increased abdominal fat, you already have disease. You have a disorder of structure and function. When we throw you the lifesaving ring of OMT, we are treating that disease more effectively and keeping your arteries and other organs open.
We have chosen to focus on higher risk patients first because that is where we can show the greatest benefit. We can show the greatest changes in clinical and financial outcomes there. That is required to prove we can make a difference with our best allies—self-insured employers and their employees. The best answer is to intervene early and keep people as far away from the falls as possible. Let’s get started.
We definitely have a sick- care system. It's more profitable to keep people sick, unfortunately.
one of the best articles!