Why Primary Care Is on Life Support

Is American primary care already past the point of no return?

In this clip from our episode “Why US Healthcare is Fundamentally Broken”, host David E. Williams and guest Zeev Neuwirth, Head of Strategic Partnerships at Rezilient Health, confront a stark reality about where primary care spending stands today.

🎙️⚕️ABOUT ZEEV NEUWIRTH, MD
For the past 30 years, his work has been centered around humanizing healthcare, making it more affordable, accessible, equitable, and effective for all people. Strategically, his approach is to leverage digital technologies, data analytics, and consumer-centric business models to create sustainable, scalable solutions. He believes it is critical that we drive towards an integrated healthcare delivery system built upon preventive primary & population-based healthcare.

In addition to his industry work, he has published two Amazon best-selling books - "Reframing Healthcare: A Roadmap For Creating Disruptive Change" and "Beyond the Walls: Megatrends, Movements, and Market Disruptors Transforming American Healthcare." His podcast, "Creating a New Healthcare" is now in its ninth year with over 200 posted episodes. These efforts are all in service of reorienting the way individuals and organizations think about healthcare, and redirecting resources and efforts to catalyze movement towards a system that delivers the healthcare and health outcomes that people want and need.

🎙️⚕️ABOUT HEALTH BIZ PODCAST
HealthBiz is a CareTalk podcast that delivers in-depth interviews on healthcare business, technology, and policy with entrepreneurs and CEOs. Host David E. Williams — president of the healthcare strategy consulting boutique Health Business Group — is also a board member, investor in private healthcare companies, and author of the Health Business Blog. Known for his strategic insights and sharp humor, David offers a refreshing break from the usual healthcare industry BS.

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Transcript

David: 0:07

That sounds good. Well, I cut you off right when you said the answer is, I feel it's like one of those movies. It's like, maybe there isn't an answer, but, you know, let's, let's hear about your answer. And, and also I'm interested why the focus on employer-based healthcare, whereas, you know, like often people say, well, you know, the government is the one that's making all the policies. So I, I'm, I'm intrigued by that employer based focus too.

Zeev: 0:30

So the solution, uh, is, is a high level one.'cause we, you know, we could, you know, spend some time getting into some big ticket items and details. But, um, and I'll, I'll give you a couple, but when you have tried something for 40, 50, 60 years and it's not working and you keep on trying and trying and you say, well, if I just throw more money at it, or if I throw more technology at it. Um, before I throw a more science at it, you keep on trying that and over and over again in different permutations. Now it's, it's ai. You know, before that it was digital technology and before that it was data. And before that it was the electronic medical record system. I mean, you know, again, the, the value of being in this game for, for so long as I have, I've seen this story, I've seen this play every, you know, this is like the sixth time and, you know, so the simple answer is do anything else but what you're doing. Do something different. I mean, it's not, it's, it's basic, basic wisdom. If what you've been doing is not working, don't do it better. Don't do it more. Do it differently. And so, a very, very concrete example, I think, you know, kind of a little bit of what you were going to is like, we spend 5% of, of healthcare dollars in this country on primary care. Okay? 5%. Um, we know. Most chronic disease, 80% of chronic disease can be mitigated, uh, reversed, radically reduced by preventive, proactive primary care. So why aren't we spending more money? Other countries spend two to three times that amount, relatively speaking on primary care. Um. We've really denuded primary care in this country and it's going away. As you said in the introduction, it's dying in the vine. When I talk to the experts around the country, primary care essentially is on life support. Right now it's in the ICU and it's dying. And I'll tell you something, uh, when that goes. Uh, you, you know, watch out. The system's gonna implode because, you know, relying on specialists, and again, I, I love specialists and I appreciate what they do. Um, some of my best friends are specialists, important, critically important work, but we have to rightsize this system.