Two points:
1. The idea that Europeans are racially superior to Americans, while flattering, is ridiculous.
2. Nowhere did I say anything about Europe, the US healthcare system delivers worse outcomes than countries throughout the world - Europe, Canada, East Asia, etc...
3. Are you so delusional that you actually people delivering A. Higher costs B. More procedures and C. Lower outcomes are better(?!) than those that have lower costs and better outcomes? And that the people delivering healthcare in America have "not a lick" to do with outcomes?!!
Please stop wasting time and space with your nonsense. I'm done.
(1) Um I didn't say that Europeans are racially superior to Americans. I said they had a better diet, were younger as a group, and had earlier access to primary care thanks to the difference in systems and thus are simply more healthy. There's nothing genetic or racial in that -- I think there are numerous case studies of emigrants to the US who succumbed to our diet and lifestyle and ended up with clogged arteries.
I think you need to reread the post if you somehow got a racial superiority notion out of that. Or maybe that was already your notion when you suggested that doctors were better elsewhere. Sorry but you missed the mark. If you are German, you come from a fairly undiverse gene pool thanks to racial cleansing efforts prior to WWII, as a result you are probably genetically inferior -- you lack a lot of beneficial genes that are out there. But you will live longer thanks to a leaner diet, working fewer hours, getting more sleep, etc. If you start eating McDonalds and KFC 5 times/week and drinking 2L of Pepsi each day, odds are you won't do as well as your US counterparts.
(2) Your screen name suggests a European basis, which is why I naturally assumed when you were speaking of "other countries" that Europe was your focus. But FWIW, the US healthcare system actually doesn't deliver worse outcomes than, say, East Asia -- a fairly poor set of nations with tons of incurable diseases. If you say the facts support this, you are making this up. As for the other nations you list, it's again an apples and oranges comparison -- you have rationed socialized healthcare to a healthier younger population in the rest of the world. And FWIW, I don't think
I ever said it had worse outcomes, I responded to
YOUR statement that the US had worse outcomes by suggesting that if that's the case, it's because the approach is quite different. The US system is actually
superior in what it accomplishes, which is far more detailed workups that meet the litigation "reasonableness" sniff test, and taking care of a far less healthy population than most European nations have. It simply delivers more, but the patients are too far gone to benefit. Again the health differences are based on diet, population age, and earlier access to primary care thanks to socialized medicine systems. So yeah the US does an AMAZING job with a much more sick and aged population. If you suggest that outcomes are worse, then there's your reason, and it has little to do with medical education and training. But again I'm taking your word for it that outcomes are all that different, not making that claim. In some countries people come to the doctor to have their one prescription adjusted. In the US they often have 5-10 daily medications, all of which need tweaking to address their multiple co-morbidities. And with the in-house legal breathing down your neck making darn sure you don't miss something or neglect checking something. It's simply a different game.
(3) Again I think you are not able to comprehend my prior post. I'm saying that US doctors are working under a series of impediments, and taking care of a far more difficult population healthwise, and thus their results far exceed what another group in similar circumstances might do. Outcome has to be driven by what you start with. If you have a basically healthy group of people and they stay healthy, that doesn't necessarilly constitute good doctoring any more than an unhealthy group of people succombing to their bad health. The bottom line is, yes the US doctors do an extraordinary job working within this framework. You unfortunately have no perspective on this -- you are looking at some raw data you found somewhere and trying to compare apples to oranges. I'm trying to explain to you the best apple in the world is going to be dismissed by you because it's not an orange. But that doesn't mean it's not the best. Just that you aren't evaluating it rationally. Because you simply lack the firsthand knowledge needed to evaluate the system and the players. The foreign doctors who move to the US and try to function under our system probably get it -- I have seen many struggle firsthand.
It's a harder system, tries to do more, is more costly. This provides better care. But a lot of this care is wasted on a population that is too sick to save. IMHO that's better healthcare to the individual than in a foreign country where healthcare is rationed and doctors don't do that extra study that might reveal some unsuspected disease because the study was too costly. In the US that study gets done, not because it is medically indicated, but because it is defensively indicated. And that's better for the patient. But so costly it breaks the system in the long run. Which is what happened. Longer trained doctors, more expensive studies and everyone getting worked up for too many things. That's BETTER healthcare for the individual, but unsustainable as a system. Get it? Outcome is irrelevant -- I already told you that the US patients as a group are sicker and older and won't do as well regardless. But they continue to live longer with those diseases in the US than anywhere else in the world (which in turn adds to that problem) because our healthcare is too good.
I think this debate is pointless because you have an agenda, and choose not to actually read what others are trying patiently to explain -- that you are starting from a shaky starting point, that outcomes are somehow better elsewhere, that healthcare in multiple countries attempts to do the same thing as in the US (in fact noplace else does healthcare seek to do as much for as many, driven by the legal system here), and that somehow doctors who manage to navigate this screwed up system aren't actually doing impressive work (which they clearly are). Sorry but you are wrong from the get go, and unless you are willing to read and learn that maybe you are far off the mark, I think you will not do so well in this system.
I think it's you who needs to stop wasting time and space with your nonsense, which I think I've pretty extensively explained. Glad you are done, hope you actually took the time to learn something (but I doubt it). Best of luck in whatever endeavor you try because an unwillingness to listen and understand tends to be a fatal flaw when going into a service industry like medicine.
