Our healthcare industry is tyrannized by the manufacturing assembly line model created by Henry Ford to build cars. That’s why we call it an industry.
Physicians are the assembly line workers. Office visits are what they produce. Their investors, primarily insurance companies, determine what they will pay physicians per visit. Many physicians also have quotas for how many office visits they must “make” each day.
Physicians have treatment protocols to follow for addressing their patients symptoms. Protocols help physicians work more efficiently so they can “make” their daily quota of patient visits.
Physicians often get bonus pay for writing prescriptions and ordering tests. Their primary purpose is to make money for their investors and themselves by “making” as many visits per day as they can.
In our healthcare industry, patients are the things on the production line. Their symptoms are problems to fix. The process for fixing them is highly mechanical.
The less time physicians spend per patient, the more visits they can “make" each day. The more visits they make, the money they and their investors make.
Physicians give an average of 7 minutes to each patient they see.
Just as assembly line workers in other manufacturing industries are being replaced by robots, so are physicians. It is a short step from in-person treatment protocols to on-line treatment protocols. Already, patients can call in and answer questions asked by a computer that will lead them through the protocol algorithm to their treatment plan. Why pay humans to do what robots can do cheaper?
Over the years of my professional healthcare career and personal life, I have consistently heard seven main reasons people seek holistic and integrative healthcare: They want-
A personal encounter with a human being that cares about them and their health. They feel the therapeutic value of the personal encounter.
Their healthcare provider to take the time to listen, discuss, and understand what is going on with them. NOTE: When they say they feel bad, they don't want their physician to tell them the tests say that there is nothing wrong with them.
To be treated as a human being not a thing on an assembly line.
To be treated as a whole person, not a set of physical symptoms.
The cause, not just the symptoms, of their disease addressed.
To use all of the safe, natural methods of healing that are available to them. This is the integrative part of healing.
To be well as a whole person with a life, not just symptom free. This is the holistic part of healing.
I have also consistently had clients and patients tell me that they are self-treating more and using complementary and alternative therapies to do so.
According to a study published in 2007 by the National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health, 4 in 10 adults in the US use some form of complementary and alternative medicine. The study reported significant increases in the use of complementary and alternative therapies over the 2002 study. The 2012 study showed little change for 2007 to 2012.
By far the most frequent form of complementary and alternative medicine used is nutritional supplements.
My clients tell me they self-treat because conventional healthcare is too expensive and confusing.
They say complementary and alternative approaches are safer and easier to access.
In my opinion, what the healthcare industry is doing is unsustainable. It's going down the same road as other manufacturing industries in the US. Time will tell if my prediction is right.
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