Let the conversation begin here. The nation’s healthcare system has become so impenetrable that people tend to ignore the topic so long as they believe someone else is paying. The truth is we all are paying. Our discussion will be centered around one doctor’s vision of fundamental transformation. Let’s discuss. If not here, where? If not now, when?    

What we call a healthcare system is actually a financial system dressed up as healthcare. The business of healthcare today has less to do with healthcare than it has to do with the business of . . .  . business. 

This became clear a few years ago as many pursued an alternative (Colorado Care): the current medical industrial complex consists largely of high-overhead providers feeding off of redirected third-party payers (e.g. Medicare, Medicaid) along with a similarly bloated insurance industry. No wonder so much of the industry is run by those from the financial, rather than the medical, sector. This is not, however, a story about bad people. It’s about mangled priorities.

The impact of all this can easily be lost in the mere statistics, like the medical industry now representing almost a fifth of GNP and about 14% of total government spending. It can also be lost when, say, skyrocketing premiums (annual premium for a family topping $14,000 at Kaiser) are largely absorbed by the employer. 

The financial impact is blatant only when it becomes up close and personal – maybe felt directly only when borne by the insured with a high deductible or, at any time, by the cash-paying uninsured. That’s when you might see the arbitrary and capricious inequities, like the inflated drug, blood test, and scan assessments for those not benefiting from the insurance-negotiated rates.

But the true issue transcends the pure financial i.e. it goes to the very essence of the doctor patient relationship. Who do you have on speed-dial, knows you and your history, when that unexpected medical event pops up?

Enter Dr. David Tusek. What he, as our lead participant, will share with us may at first sound radical. Maybe radical is what’s called for – something so basic, compelling, and scalable that it becomes obvious only in hindsight. We will discuss his Direct Primary Care Model, a movement emanating right here. 

Central to the DPC model is the notion that when it comes to healthcare the relationship that really counts is that of doctor and patient. This doctor advocacy extends not only to treatment but to cost containment. Add to that the integration of the many other elements in support of true health care over the unwieldy, often-conflicted sick care system we have today.

Listen closely and you may detect a disturbance in the Force as if millions of special interests cry out in terror and were suddenly silenced.

(This session will present us with the opportunity to offer suggestions to Dr. Tusek as he prepares to more formally introduce his thoughts as Keynote Speaker at the June 29 Highland Institute event entitled, "Moving Beyond the Pandemic; What It Means to Be a Healthy Human and a Healthy Community")