Importance of Physicians in the World of Corporate Medicine
Importance of Physicians in the World of Corporate Medicine
In my 15–20 years of medical career, I have seen careers of doctors shaped by a multitude of factors.
After Indian globalization of 1993, slowly the Indian medical market is shifting to corporate medicine, where the patient–doctor relationship is defined by 10–15 minutes of consultations. Majority of patients reaching physicians are full of distrust and ambiguity about treatment options that will be meted out to choose.
In this chaotic world of advertising, beautiful but costly hospital designs and systematised albeit mechanical process flows, patients are more & more dependent on heavy medical insurances to protect them & their families in this last minute heavy expenditures. On the other extreme, there are thousands who are unwilling to pay anything for healthcare & completely rely on govt facilities & govt funded schemes like “Ayushman Bharat”.
Numbers say that, we have roughly 10–12% of population covered by health insurances. Even if we assume the percentage of population accessing govt healthcare facilities to be 25–30%, I always ask myself, where is this remaining 50–55% population getting their health coverage? . In my 20 years of experience, I saw very few people paying by pocket for hospital admissions. One view by researchers is that the needy, reach those facilities which provide free or subsidized healthcare like CGHS , ECHS, govt/ semi- govt or factory healthcare setups etc. Even if considered partially right, the percentage of population covered by such schemes would not be more than 8–10%.
This again brings me back to my question: Where the 40–45% of my population is getting healthcare access from?
They are actually not seen in any system, because they fulfill their healthcare needs from local physicians / family physicians or small medical setups, who build their businesses based on trust & personal connect.
So, when I try to practice in corporate medicine, I do lot of efforts to balance this gap by directly connecting, listening, applying and practicing empathy. So as to make my patient satisfied and feels that his healthcare needs are properly met.
I every day remind myself that, even though importance of health insurances and corporate medicine could not be underrated, it is also worthy for doctor in us to understand our roots as Physicians.