The hypocrisy of this particular Dem-MSM smear is absolutely breathtaking. After spending a year shoving government-run health care down the throats of an unwilling electorate, the Democrats and their media accomplices are attacking Dr. Paul for—-accepting patients covered by government medical coverage:
Kentucky GOP Senate candidate Rand Paul says he opposes federal handouts, but the eye doctor takes government payments for treating Medicare and Medicaid patients.
The hilarious thing is that this is a VIRTUE. Both Medicare (which covers seniors) and Medicaid (which covers the poor) pay less than cost. That means he is LOSING MONEY to treat these folks. What would they have him do? Refuse to treat these elderly and poor patients because he doesn’t make enough money on them?
Paul campaign manager Jesse Benton defended Paul’s acceptance of Medicare and Medicaid payments, saying that to shun the two health care programs would ‘penalize his older patients or his poor patients.’
If the Dem-MSM smear machine had discovered that he was refusing to accept these patients, it would be churning out lies about a “greedy Republican” too interested in profits to treat the elderly and the poor. This kind of hypocrisy is why the public hates the MSM and why the voters are going to fire the Dems in November.
UPDATE:
I almost forgot. This story completely discredits the smear about Dr. Paul’s board certification. There isn’t the slightest possibility that Medicare or Medicaid would have issued provider numbers to any physician certified by some phony board.
UPDATE TO THE UPDATE:
Well, it looks like I stuck my keyboard in my mouth with the above update. Although there are board certification questions on some Medicaid and Medicare Advantage apps, the provider app for traditional Medicare (see Rich’s comment below) doesn’t contain any query at all about such certifications. Moreover, there isn’t any evidence (as Gaulte points out below) that board certification is a requirement for Medicare participation. So, on this point, I was guilty of promulgating “health care BS.�
This does, however, beg the following question: Why do the “news� media care about Rand Paul’s board certification when even CMS doesn’t require such certification for enrollment in the flagship government health care program?
Comments 9
A few points. First, you don’t know what his costs are so you can’t say he gets less than cost. He’s obviously doing more than all right with about half his patients on Medicare. Second, as a far right free market acolyte he is being hypocritical. And third, the future clearly points to physicians being not only certified but signed up to maintenance of certification, and your health reform bill does I believe make provision for this in the quality reporting programme.
Posted 17 Jun 2010 at 5:01 am ¶You don’t know what his costs are so you can’t say he gets less than cost.
Don’t’ be ridiculous, Marc. That Medicare and Medicaid pay below cost for physicians and hospitals is a well-documented reality that no informed observer bothers to dispute. Even those specialists who receive (relatively) decent reimbursement for some procedures get hammered on office visits. That’s why there is a serious and worsening doctor shortage for patients covered under these programs.
Posted 17 Jun 2010 at 5:36 am ¶Actually, as far as I know board certification is not a requirement to have a provider number issued nor to received Medicare/Medicaid reimbursement.
Posted 17 Jun 2010 at 5:54 am ¶As far as I know board certification is not a requirement …
As it happens, one of my staff just finished a Medicaid application for one of our docs. and it contains two questions that specifically address board certification. I haven’t had the misfortune of reading a Medicare application in more than a year (thank God), but I’m pretty sure the NPI app has similar questions. Hopefully, even CMS (which dictates the guidelines for both programs) would not ask for such basic information for no reason (although that is certainly not a given).
Posted 17 Jun 2010 at 6:01 am ¶Well there you go. Continuous professional education and accreditation is likely to become more important in the US and elsewhere as medicine advances more quickly and also because those who don’t perform enough of a complex procedure must be stopped.
And as for payments, I’ve asked you this so many times but you’ve never answered. Are you willing to pay more tax to fund Medicare/Medicaid payments? If not, what cuts will you make to fund the payments? Bear in mind that the US is already paying double or more per head for healthcare than other developed nations.
Posted 17 Jun 2010 at 1:27 pm ¶Continuous professional education and accreditation are not limited to the specialty boards. Medicare asks for board status but makes no requirement of certification or continuing education, at least not to date.
I am not willing to pay more tax for Medicare/Medicaid. the Medicare problem could be improved by allowing balance billing (at least in primary care) thus allowing providers to compete on price, quality, and customer service.
Medicaid could be improved by stopping payment for such things as tylenol, talc powder, otc athletes foot remedies, Viagra, taxi fare, aspirin, multivitamins, petrolatum jelly, and many others. Anyone coming to the office with an iPhone and nikes should pay for their own condoms.
Posted 17 Jun 2010 at 4:20 pm ¶Here is the Medicare New Provider Application:
http://www.cms.gov/cmsforms/downloads/cms855i.pdf
and here is the NPI application:
http://www.cms.gov/cmsforms/downloads/CMS10114.pdf
Neither mentions anything about Board status or board certification, nor do they provide an opportunity to report it.
Posted 17 Jun 2010 at 4:49 pm ¶Boy. I’m sure glad I decided to gild the lily with that update. I inadvertently did Marc’s job (i.e. introduce a gratuitous distraction).
At any rate, just so you don’t think I’ve been hitting the jug, here are two Medicaid applications (from different states, neither of which is mine) that ask for board certification info. The board certification question is on page 2 of each:
http://medicaidalaska.com/Downloads/Providers/AK_Provider_Application_02012010.pdf
http://medicaidprovider.hhs.mt.gov/pdf/enrollform.pdf
The app for my state is similar, and does explicitly ask for board cert info, but that’s because the fiscal intermediary (ACS) is the same as these two states. In states that use EDS (now HP) as their FI, the apps don’t ask for board certification information.
Which brings me to Rich’s Medicare provider apps. CMS allows some latitude to the fiscal intermediaries for Medicare and Medicaid on a variety of program implementation details. As the Medicaid examples suggest, this includes some tinkering with the provider apps.
So, either my memory has betrayed me and conflated an app from some other provider with a Medicare app, or my region’s FI (or MAC, as it is now called) enhanced the basic CMS form with a question about board certification.
In the morning, I’ll ask the poor wretch who actually birddogs these apps. Details at eleven.
Posted 17 Jun 2010 at 9:14 pm ¶Rich, Gaulte, et al … See the above mea culpa in my “update to the update” (on the board certification issue).
Posted 20 Jun 2010 at 10:55 pm ¶Post a Comment