Up to the minute information for your financial success. 

Note . . . this month’s Minute concludes our series of articles outlining news and viewpoints around the current U.S. healthcare reform debate. As with the earlier articles, the views expressed here are not necessarily reflective of views held by PBN or PBN employees.

Healthcare Reform Legislation Public Debate Winding Down . . . If the mainstream media can still be believed, the public debate over health care reform is winding down and five separate bills are headed to congress for floor debate and a vote--this may be your last chance to have a say in the debate.

Here again are official links to contact information for all U.S. Senators of the 111th Congress including emails, phone numbers, and webforms. and a directory of U.S. State Legislatures.

You can read summaries and the complete text of the bills, and follow their progress through congress here.

Ideas and issues

Last month's Minute ended with the thought that, once you get past the political aspects of the debate, the primary obstacle to reforms is how to realistically fund them. Ultimately, we decided that the only practical and politically expedient way is to find and correct systemic inefficiencies. This month we take a quick look at some specific practical changes that could pay for themselves through added efficiencies (which, no surprise, are mostly proposed by MDs). These come from the excellent PBS Series Healthcare Crisis: Who's at Risk (still relevant to today's debate even though it first aired in 2000).

Refocus medical research on what actually works in practice

Dr. E. Haavi Morreim, PhD, Professor, Dept. of Human Values and Ethics, College of Medicine University of Tennessee suggests that Instead of prescribing any treatment that may or may not work regardless of cost and instead of focusing research on cutting edge cures, we reallocate research funds to find out which treatments offer the greatest return for the cost for most patients.

Return Autonomy to Doctors and Patients

Marcia Angell, MD Editor-in-Chief, New England Journal of Medicine urges a move away from a managed care system that incentivizes doctors for doing less, and a move away from the "cowboy country" economy that sees heathcare as a commodity rather than a public need, instead moving toward a value-based system where we get more return on what we pay for healthcare.

Make it a Top-to-Bottom Fix

The CEO of Cerner recently made an impassioned plea for including the new middle (the patient and patient records) in reform efforts and for improvement in "communication and coordination among health care providers" as an area that clearly needs improvement and would pay for itself and provide for better care.

Likewise, companies that provide medical business services should continue researching, developing, and identifying new efficiencies in the business of healthcare practice, like efficiencies gained by using a single-source provider that includes billing, practice management, financial planning, banking, contracts, audits and taxes. PBN’s hub and spoke services model provides the kinds of efficiencies needed for effective healthcare reform.

To learn more about how PBN's Hub and Spoke services model creates efficiencies in the business of healthcare practice, contact David Gaston, PBN Business Development, 800.288.4901,

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