Ron DeSantis: Tear Down Barriers and Empower Patients
Opinion by: E. Eugene Webb PhD
Author: In Search of Robin, So You Want to Blog.
A New Challenge for a New Time
By
2020, official estimates predict Florida will have a population of 26.5 million
people with 20 percent over the age of 65.
As our population grows and ages, our health care system must adapt and
evolve. Ron DeSantis understands that a
one-size-fits-all solution will not meet the diverse needs of our state. Ron DeSantis believes that we must contain
costs in order to expand access and protect the quality of our health care
system.
Empower Patients
Floridians
have more choices in picking out their cellphone plans than their health
insurance plans. Every day in the grocery store, we make decisions about what
we want to buy, weighing price, necessity, and quality, and deciding what’s
right for us. But, when it comes to something as important as health care, we
have fewer choices and less information.
Government, insurance companies, and the health care bureaucracy have,
by accident or by design, created a system difficult to understand, hard to
navigate and impossible to control. Ron
DeSantis wants to tear down those barriers and empower patients. He wants to
look past the 20th Century paradigm of employer-provided insurance vs.
government-provided insurance. On the health care train, Ron DeSantis believes
the patient should be the conductor, not the passenger. We live in a large, diverse state and
Floridians have different needs and wants.
In health care, one-size doesn’t have to fit all.
As Governor, Ron DeSantis will ensure
every patient has:
The
Right to Buy the health care plan that works best for them and their families.
We can accomplish this by modernizing Florida’s insurance laws so patients have
access to non-traditional products, like expanded, direct physician care
agreements or tailored plans, like short-term coverage or limited-benefit plans.
Ron DeSantis will push the Federal government to allow for expanded use of
association health plans and to change Federal tax laws to allow individuals to
carry their own individual health plans from employer to employer.
The
Right to Know how much their health care really costs by aggressively
implementing Florida’s groundbreaking health price transparency law and giving
Floridians real-time information about actual prices and outcomes.
The
Right to Shop for lower cost health care options by incentivizing insurance
companies to share some of the savings they realize with the patient in the
form of cash payments.
The
Right to Quality health care by resisting any effort to ration health care by
giving bureaucrats in Tallahassee control over personal health decisions.
Protect Access for Patients with
Pre-Existing Conditions
Ron
DeSantis believes that no person should be denied access to medical care based
on the existence of a pre-existing condition.
It has been a well-settled Federal law for more than 20 years that
insurance companies may not exclude a pre-existing condition from coverage nor
charge higher premiums for an insured who moves from one health plan to
another. The recent issue related to
pre-existing conditions has focused on a smaller group – people with serious
health problems who are uninsured and are now mandated by Federal law to
purchase insurance. Should a Federal
court strike down the protections afforded to this subgroup or should Congress
repeal the law, Ron DeSantis will work to ensure hard-to-insure Floridians with
significant health needs have access to coverage by creating a more diverse,
robust insurance market that will enable and encourage Floridians to buy
insurance before they get sick.
Expand the Reach of Our Providers
A
strong system requires strong components, and for Florida’s health care system
that means expanded training and better retention of health care workers,
particularly doctors and nurses. We
should partner with our universities and medical schools to bring the
highest-quality programs and the most cutting-edge research to Florida. Ron DeSantis wants Florida to become a
national leader in medical innovation by allowing hospitals and doctors to use
state-of-the-art technology, like telemedicine.
In our globally-connected world, no Floridian should go untreated
because of a lack of access to specialists.
Support Our Seniors
Ron
DeSantis hopes all Floridians are able to lead long, happy, healthy and
productive lives. However, as we age, we
face challenges from the worsening of chronic diseases to age-related
conditions, like dementia and Alzheimer’s Disease. Ron DeSantis will fight to keep Florida’s
network of senior services – from community access to home care to assisted-living
facilities to nursing homes – ready and able to meet the needs of our seniors.
Maintain Our Social Safety Net
Ron
DeSantis recognizes government has an obligation to those who are truly unable
to help themselves. He will continue to
support Florida’s longstanding tradition of providing access to health care and
social services for economically-distressed pregnant women, children, persons
with disabilities, persons suffering from catastrophic illnesses and
seniors. Ron DeSantis will also keep Florida’s
network of safety-net hospitals strong and armed with the resources they need
to continue providing high-quality care to those Floridians unable to pay. He will advocate for expanded access to and
early intervention of mental health and substance abuse treatment programs.
Respect Taxpayers’ Money
Florida
spends more public money (41.7 percent) on health and human services than on
any part of the state budget, which means there is a greater risk of
inefficiency, waste, fraud and abuse. As
Governor, Ron DeSantis will fight to ensure Floridians see real value for their
public investment. He will continue to
support Florida’s groundbreaking Medicaid managed-care model, which has helped
to curb the growth of that entitlement program.
He will also aggressively combat fraud in Medicaid and other health and
human services programs. No one – no
individual, no doctor, no insurance company – is above the law.
Help Floridians Struggling with Opioid
Addiction
Florida
has recently made some strong first steps in addressing the opioid addiction
crisis but much work remains. As
Governor, Ron DeSantis will advocate for expanded access to and early
intervention of mental health and substance abuse treatment programs. He will
work with our local partners to leverage local resources. Numerous communities, civic and religious
organizations throughout the state assist victims of addiction. Rather than
duplicating those efforts, Ron DeSantis will help these local organizations to
develop best practices, facilitate resource sharing and identify new avenues
for financial support. He will also seek
federal-state partnerships to bring new dollars to opioids fight, while
ensuring we are measuring the real-world effectiveness of our programs. He will also finish implementing Florida’s
medical marijuana constitutional amendment so sufferers of chronic pain have
access to an alternative to the use of opioids.
As Governor, Ron DeSantis will not let the Washington or Tallahassee
bureaucracy get in the way of helping those in need.
E-mail Doc at mail to:
dr.gwebb@yahoo.com or send
me a Facebook (E. Eugene Webb) Friend request. Like or share on Facebook and follow me on TWITTER @DOC ON THE BAY.
See Doc's Photo Gallery at Bay Post Photos.
Disclosures:
Contributor
to: Rick Scott for US Senate , Ron DeSantis for Florida
Governor
Please
comment below
No comments:
Post a Comment