MEDICAL MATTERS

The news today talks about the consultant fees in hospitals, highlighting costs that would seem to me to be excessive. A quick check on AI tells me that the average would be, let’s say, up to €400K a year. Call-out fees, private work etc, seem to bump this up. Earnings of €1M have been reported.
 
That amount would pay a lot of farmers to provide food as medicine. It’s easy to say that. But that is not how it works, alas.
 
We justify huge amounts of money and resources to be spent on health. Is it value for money?
 
Here’s a crazy idea. What if such consultants were paid on the success outcome? What if they were rewarded to reduce patient numbers by ensuring they recovered? We appear to measure the metric of medications delivered as a success.
 
Medication overload and toxicity is being increasingly acknowledged, though, and the reality is sobering. Have we poisoned a generation with paracetamol? The genie is out of the bottle regardless of the scientific skirmishes of who is right and wrong. We are beginning to question everything as a population, and that is no harm. Maybe this nourishing food thing is encouraging critical thinking…
 
I am keeping an eye on a company called Revero.
 
Here is the future of healthcare, where the expertise is in your pocket as a tech enabled on line medical clinic. Virtual clinics of experts to support you find the root cause of your issue. Autoimmunity being a hot topic among the other metabolic disorders.
 
Of course, the personal touch is important but hey this is a game changer on health care costs. I wonder will it come to Ireland? Or is this model here already?? Let me know…

​Anne Maher