alt Hacker NewsI would maybe modify this to say - there is a strong incentive to be efficient - you only make so much money per encounter, DRG visit to the hospital, etc. So the pressure from "management" on a lot of us clinicians is to see more people per day, make each hospital visit as short as possible, etc. Medicaid providers now see something like 50-60 patients a day because the per-patient visit is relatively low. But there isn't as much incentive for outcomes. I think CMS has tried it in the past, but with varying success. Whether this new mousetrap will work, who knows.
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There are a million doctors in the U.S. so if they're each seeing 60 patients per day that would mean that 17% of the population needs to be seen by a doctor daily.
That would put hospitals somewhere between churches and offices in terms of the impact they have attracting attendance.
The existing CPT codes (roughly) pay proportionately to physician time (RVUs). So I wouldn't say there's an an incentive toward delivering care efficiently, but rather hospital management wants to maximize billable hours.