HEALTHY ONLINE

So you think there is a war on doctors, don’t you? It certainly looks that way from your particular vantage point. The government is deftly intruding into your professional life with a computerized fifth column that is extracting information on your every move, and to add insult to injury, it forces you to actually collect the data which is to be used against you in the court of public opinion. Media outlets are stepping all over each other to be first in line with sensational headlines implying reckless abandonment to greed in a profession believed to hold higher ethical standards than most. And the ever louder calls to rein in the seemingly rampant waste, fraud and abuse in health care, are becoming synonymous to reining in doctors’ irresponsible conduct.  The art of rabble rousing has always included oblique references to how the mighty have fallen. What is unique about the modern day twilight of the doctors is that it has practically nothing to do with the doctors themselves. There

It’s here. For the first time in 35 years (or 33 , depending on which click bait headline you clicked on), the much anticipated data on Medicare payments to physicians, has been released to the public, on the historic date of April 9th, 2014. “Data trove shows U.S. doctors reap millions from Medicare”, according to the distinguished Reuters news service. The Washington Post will tell you “[e]verything you need to know about today’s unprecedented Medicare pricing data dump” and Pro Publica , which specializes in rendering doctors transparent, is announcing more tools for picking doctors coming soon, based on these data. If you want to read juicy stories about a handful of crooks who happen to have a medical license, and who were already under investigation by Medicare, click on some of the links above or below. If you want to understand what this all means to you, stay with me and keep reading. The data released by Medicare includes the doctor’s name, address and specialty. For each