Stephen Dexter’s and David Ramsey’s dreams for health-care in America mirror some of the central tenets of the Affordable Care Act — to them, universal health care with a smaller price tag aligns well with the missions and visions of the nonprofit health systems they lead.
But Ramsey, the president and CEO of Charleston Area Medical Center Health System, and Dexter, president and CEO of Thomas Health System, said other key pieces of the health-care law will make it harder for some patients to receive care.
“We’re constantly talking with our elected representatives, and physician organizations are doing the same. We’re trying, but to no avail,” Ramsey said. “If anything, it’s going in the opposite direction, and causing the costs to become greater. The ACA was put in place to ensure every American had insurance. You may have insurance — I can assure you that it won’t be affordable.”
Ramsey and Dexter were part of a question-and answer lecture on everything from the viability of the ACA to national and regional physician shortages to the involvement of family in patient care during “How Healthy Is Healthcare?,” an installment of the University of Charleston’s speaker series held Tuesday at the school and moderated by UC President Ed Welch.
Many of the questions were geared toward the ACA, the healthcare reform law passed in 2010 and enacted last year.
Both Ramsey and Dexter said that from a cost-savings perspective, more socialized systems of health-care found in countries like Canada and Great Britain are better, but there are multiple factors standing in the way of making a similar shift in the United States.
“Personally, I’d put everyone on Medicare and say ‘we’re all equal, and now we have to figure out, as a society, how much we’re willing to spend on health care,” Dexter said. “I think the health-care system has been around in America for so long, and the insurance industry is a huge component of it; people like having insurance where their doctor will say, ‘Oh, come in and I’ll see you today,’ so I don’t think it will change in my lifetime.”
Dexter said he approves of certain aspects of the bill — he has adult children under 26, and prefers that they would be allowed to remain on his health insurance plan. He also has a son with complicated medical issues who would previously have gone uninsured.
Ramsey said that in its current state, the law has created a “hidden tax” for those with commercial insurance — many insurance plans are shifting more cost to the consumer in the form of higher deductibles. Dexter said that if a person is privately insured, they’re likely paying twice what is necessary for their health-care.
“Really, America is the only industrialized nation where private industry is subsidizing government health-care,” Dexter said.
Nearly 150,000 West Virginians have enrolled in Medicaid since the expansion, but Ramsey said hospitals like CAMC are still struggling, in part because almost half of the system’s patients are Medicare recipients, and the federal government cut Medicare reimbursement payments to fund the Medicaid expansion.
“I think the tenets of the Affordable Care Act are what everyone in this business would like to see happen; all of us got into the nonprofit health-care business to try to take care of society and do good for people. No one who works at CAMC doesn’t have that idea or mission,” Ramsey said. “Could everyone come see us with no question of how to pay for it? That would be a utopia. It won’t happen, but it’s what all of us who work in the industry would like to happen.”
The next event in the UC Speaker Series will be a continuation of Tuesday’s event on health care in America. Jim Conway, an adjunct lecturer at the Harvard School of Public Health and senior consultant for Safe and Reliable Healthcare, will discuss patient safety and patient and family involvement in care from 6:30 p.m. to 8 p.m. Nov. 11 in the Geary Auditorium of Riggleman Hall on UC’s campus.
Date: October 28, 2014