Common Sense Health Care Solutions: ER doctors ALREADY know the answer

I recently had a conversation with an ER doctor (emergency room doctor) concerning the health care debate happening now in Washington. The ER doctor gave me his opinion as follows:"The answer is totally obvious. Today in the US the bulk of uninsured patients are seen in emergency rooms across the country. About 90% of the work we do for these patients could be handled by the military medics coming home from Iraq and Afghanistan. The United States should allow these guys to set up small clinics in every nook and cranny of the US to handle this 90% of the uninsured 'front line' medical work load. The 10% of cases these medics cannot handle could be 'kicked upstairs' and referred to a local doctor or to a local ER."The doctor went on to tell me that these clinics would probably charge about $10. to see a patient, AND they would be a completely privatized solution to the problem of treating 'front line' medical cases of the uninsured in the US. Further he stated:"For these clinics to work in the US, the government would need to give these medics and their clinics immunity from lawyers looking for contingency targets." The doctor asked me, "Have you noticed that Vietnamese entrepreneurs have set up 'finger nail painting shops' all over California? Given a conducive regulatory environment for opening small 'medic run medical clinics', you'd see an explosion of activity in setting up 'front line' medical clinics WITHOUT one dime being spent by the federal or state governments."The conversation progressed to the subject of medications that the medics would need to perform their functions. The doctor continued:"MOST of the medications that would be used by these medics (for their 90% of the medical work load) can be sourced over the counter today, WITHOUT PRESCRIPTION in Mexico. Realize that literally MILLIONS of uninsured people drive every month to the Mexican boarder to buy their medication over the counter in Mexico. Why can't there be a section of the local CVS Pharmacy that dispenses Mexican medications, available without prescription, as is the case in Mexico? This is a free country, and as such, nobody would be required to buy the Mexican product. But what about the uninsured patient who today drives to Mexico to buy his/her medications? An uninsured patient should be able to pay $10. for a visit to a medic run 'front line' clinic in Los Angeles (for example) to treat his daughter's ear ache (for example). The medic would look in the child's ear and suggest going to the local Longs Drug store to buy say the Mexican children's penicillin. Problem solved and WITHOUT a visit to an emergency room and without a dime being spent by the state and federal government."The doctor went on to ask me if I had any idea how many foreign paramedics would come to the US to set up these clinics if this entrepreneurial arrangement were available, and if they were protected from liability while treating people? He said that there would be a "gold rush" of paramedic opportunity seekers from say India and/or the Philippines to set up these clinics. Rural and inner city 'front line' health care would suddenly become a reality and WITHOUT a new load on the state and federal governments.OK, so I have one more story which illustrates the issues addressed above by the emergency room doctor, and how the ER doctor's ideas could have averted a major medical disaster which happened to a person very close to me. This patient is a close personal friend of mine:For some number of years I have known a young woman who worked as a checker at a local Shell gas station. This woman is an immigrant from El Salvador and essentially worked for some years at minimum wage and without health insurance. This woman is a perfect example of how the ER doctor's 'solution' to the nation's health care problem could have saved a precious young life. So in the course of daily conversation this woman revealed to me that she had high blood pressure. To say "high" is an understatement. It turns out this woman had blood pressure in the range of 200/120 which put her at risk of many ailments to say the least. I'm not a doctor, but I advised her that she MUST get this problem treated, and I was rebuffed by the statement that she was not insured. I told her that the problem was too scary to let slide, and I told her that she should go to either a "free clinic" or a local emergency room and find out what medication was appropriate to bring down her blood pressure. Then I advised her that she can drive to Tijuana Mexico (about a 3 hour drive from here) and buy the medication she needed over the counter and without prescription. Problem solved I thought. Well, this gal did exactly what I recommended and for a time she in fact had brought her blood pressure under control. Then came the high gasoline prices of a couple of years ago. I had a conversation with this gal at the time and she informed me that she had stopped taking her blood pressure medication because the gasoline prices made the trip to TJ too expensive!Result: At 32 years old this woman had a massive stroke, a bleed in her brain which landed her in an intensive care hospital room coma for approx. 3 months. Amazingly she survived the stroke, but in a considerably diminished condition. If I had to guess, the taxpayers of the State of California paid in excess of 200 thousand dollars to keep this woman in intensive care for 3+ months.This woman's stroke and the associated expense could probably have been avoided.Opinion: Why did this have to happen to my El Salvadoran friend? Why can't we implement the ideas above and LARGELY solve the problem once and for all for the uninsured, and avoid the associated expense now born by the taxpayers? Why did the State of California taxpayers have to shoulder 200 thousand plus dollars in expenses when this stroke could have been avoided with the simple preventative medicine solution outlined above? Why couldn't my El Salvadoran friend buy her Mexican blood pressure medication from the local Longs Drug store "over the counter" and avoid a costly drive down to Tijuana? Is it that nobody has THOUGHT about the solution outlined above? ER doctors ALREADY know what SHOULD be done. Perhaps nobody has asked them! Is the problem the entrenched special interests here in the US? Who would be on the "special interest" list NOT wanting the simple privatized solutions outlined above? Perhaps, trial lawyers, doctors, US drug companies, hospitals, insurance industry?Recently I was watching an interview with Warren Buffett where Warren stated the he didn't know the answer to the health care debate but that the correct answer needs to be absolutely unilateral for there to be any real benefit to the American people and to the US economy. Warren stated that healthcare expense in the US is higher in percentage terms than any other developed nation.Well then, the solution above is a privatized solution without ANY additional load on the American taxpayer or the American economy. Further the load currently being born by the emergency rooms of this nation would be greatly reduced as preventative medicine would be offloaded to the private sector. Inexpensive "front line" medicine would suddenly be within the grasp of the currently uninsured in the US. Further, my El Salvadoran friend's 200 thousand dollar coma probably could have been avoided.I sincerely hope that this editorial reaches the ears of the correct politicians open minded enough to accept a very simple, common sense solution to a big part of our health care dilemma.