Kankakee Daily Journal , October 3, 2007

With the release of Michael Moore's "Sicko," a documentary on the U.S. health care system, and the upcoming election hot topic of health care reform, it's time for voters to get an education on the current status of health care.

In "What States Can Do to Reform Healthcare" us nonclinical folk get an insider's view into the stumbling blocks of health care and how government policies influence the quality and cost of health care.

I've always said that in order to stay afloat today, each family must contain one lawyer, one doctor and one person who knows how to navigate the health care system. It is obvious the system needs repair and this free-market primer, commissioned by The Pacific Research Institute, advocates the removal of government restrictions in healthcare to allow for open competition in medicine to help drive down prices. This theorizes that price wars by the newly unrestricted doctors and hospitals will let the good rise to the top and the poorer providers collapse through improved consumer options. I think they left out an important need but let's save that for later.

The text takes on such topics as State Medicaid reform, elimination of the Certificate of Need program, malpractice liability limits, expanding nonphysician clinicians services and alternate sources of prescriptions.

For each subject, examples of working policies in different parts of the United States were presented. Most of the solutions mentioned are for the short-term benefit of the consumer which may relieve some pocket pain only to create real pain down the road.

In an admittedly biased opinion, I feel that some points may work in portions of the country but not in every part of the country. A complete overhaul of the system would be needed to make all of these suggestions work.

Specifically, when the restrictions are removed and the high-end providers swoop in to cherry pick those patients with the best insurance, who provides for the others?

Medicaid reform would need to be the first domino to fall. I agree tort reforms need to be re-evaluated when awards in malpractice cases can be 6 times higher in Illinois than in other states with tort limits in place.

Although I didn't agree with all the answers of this book, it did raise my awareness of options to health care solutions. Think I'll get a second opinion.