Death panel nonsense back?

February 12, 2017 by 1 Comment

A Florida county Republican Party official said there were “death panels for Medicare beneficiaries over age 74” yesterday at a town hall meeting. There are not. Watching the video, it is unclear if the fellow was just saying something to try and make it through a meeting, or if he really believes this. Both are bad.

Just last week in BMJ Palliative Care (bmjspcare-2016-001182-bhavsar), we published an analysis of the federal register comments for the proposed rule (now policy since Jan 1, 2016) that let Medicare pay physicians for Advance Care Planning in which they discussed wishes and preferences with patients and family members. Very few of the comments submitted were negative, and we entitled the piece “The Death of Outrage Over Talking About Dying.”

Maybe we spoke too soon….

Nrupen A. Bhavsar, Sara Constand, Matthew Harker, Donald H. Taylor, Jr. The Death of Outrage Over Talking About Dying.BMJ Supportive and Palliative Care 2017;early online, accessed February 12, 2017.

Filed under Health Policy, health reform, Politics

About Don Taylor
Professor of Public Policy (with appointments in Business, Nursing, Community and Family Medicine, and the Duke Clinical Research Institute), and Chair of the Academic Council at Duke University https://academiccouncil.duke.edu/ . I am one of the founding faculty of the Margolis Center for Health Policy. My research focuses on improving care for persons who are dying, and I am co-PI of a CMMI award in Community Based Palliative Care. I teach both undergrads and grad students at Duke. On twitter @donaldhtaylorjr

One Response to Death panel nonsense back?

  1. Pingback: More on Advance Care Planning in Medicare | freeforall

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