“The primary care physician has been reduced to such a role in the system that nobody wants to [coordinate care] any more, and those that do quickly find out they can't afford to do that very effectively. So the system needs to strengthen the role of primary care physicians.”
PPAC member Dr. Jeffrey Ross, a Houston physician and podiatrist, asked why CMS was not looking more at preventive measures. “Why aren't we looking at preventive means [when patients are] in their 50s or when they just become beneficiaries before we do major interventional treatment later on, in the last year, when it's costing millions and millions of dollars?” he said.
For patients with diabetes, “maybe before they are diagnosed as diabetics or develop heart failure, we should be looking at exercise, looking at diet, and looking at primary care as a means to intervene before major intervention takes place.”