Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The planning of U.S. physician shortages (2020)

niskanencenter.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

121–130 of 377 posts

Re: The planning of U.S. physician shortages (2020)

#121

Post by rcarr »

FredPret wrote: post #95
the_d3f4ult wrote: post #62

Being a physician is a horrible career move right now. As a former Math/CS major turned eye surgeon, I can't help but think about how much easier my life would be had I stuck with tech. It's hard to understand exactly how hard the job is until you've lived it. I saw 40 patient's in clinic today in 8 hours without lunch or any kind of downtime and then spent 2 hours at the hospital because a patient needed an emergent…

Just as an aside, I imagine there would be cool medical device startups working on smart glasses / artificial eyes. They probably wouldn’t even advertise for an ophthalmologist/ CS / Math person, because I think there’s probably only the one of you!

With the rise of AR/VR this guy could probably make bank in the coming years.

Re: The planning of U.S. physician shortages (2020)

#122

Post by wrp »

Dalewyn wrote: post #113
wrp wrote: post #110

What is a nutshell explanation of how healthcare got to the overall shortage state? (For the USA, but curious about other countries.) In the past 20 years, costs have shot up, doctors are seeing many more patients, and quality of care seems to have generally declined. Where have the resources gone? In the 1990s my GP had time to shoot the breeze for 20 minutes or more. Now I get a 5-minute diagnosis on the run, after…

Grossly insufficient pay for the work concerned. This applies to everywhere, US and otherwise. Unless you are a saint given existence upon this mortal plane instead of the high heavens, there are simply no objectively good reasons for ordinary men to pursue a career in medical.

I get how low wages could cause personnel shortages, but how does the tremendously rising cost of medical come out of this? I would expect the causation to be rising costs => stalled wages => personnel shortages.

Re: The planning of U.S. physician shortages (2020)

#123

Post by trashface »

the_d3f4ult wrote: post #62

Being a physician is a horrible career move right now. As a former Math/CS major turned eye surgeon, I can't help but think about how much easier my life would be had I stuck with tech. It's hard to understand exactly how hard the job is until you've lived it. I saw 40 patient's in clinic today in 8 hours without lunch or any kind of downtime and then spent 2 hours at the hospital because a patient needed an emergent…

This viewpoint is just plain crazy. If you worked in tech you'd be totally disposable, just like all the rest of us programming drones. Hit 40-50 and boom, unless you've transitioned into management, suddenly no one wants to hire you, or if they do its half of what you were making before.

Your MD degree and the AMA literally writing laws on your behalf limits labor supply competition like nothing in tech. You may have noted 250K+ tech layoffs in last year or so. Many of those people could probably code circles around you. Where are the physician layoffs? There aren't any.

If you want fewer hours, work fewer hours. What are they going to do, fire you? They can't. There is a shortage as this notes.

Re: The planning of U.S. physician shortages (2020)

#124

Post by Falkon1313 »

HyperSane wrote: post #37
trustingtrust wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hope it’s not as easy to make a doctor as it is to make an engineer. I am an engineer dating a surgical resident who has to go through so much training that an engineer would never even come close to an engineer. The room for error is quite small. If it was as easy to make a doctor as an engineer I would lose faith in the medical system and would never want such a doctor opening me up.

If being a doctor is so incredibly hard then why are they allowed to practice after not sleeping for so long?

Well it's not that hard, or that important, they're not truck drivers.

Re: The planning of U.S. physician shortages (2020)

#125

Post by hn976827 »

the_d3f4ult wrote: post #62

Being a physician is a horrible career move right now. As a former Math/CS major turned eye surgeon, I can't help but think about how much easier my life would be had I stuck with tech. It's hard to understand exactly how hard the job is until you've lived it. I saw 40 patient's in clinic today in 8 hours without lunch or any kind of downtime and then spent 2 hours at the hospital because a patient needed an emergent…

> Physician salaries are the only ones that do not grow relative to inflation

Spoken with the true conviction of a position of privilege, and blinded by the very same. (No pun intended.)

Hint: The majority of U.S. citizens have it worse than you.

Re: The planning of U.S. physician shortages (2020)

#126

Post by unnamed76ri »

DangitBobby wrote: post #8
unnamed76ri wrote: post #3

[flagged]

Given the reach and power of the US government, you can trivially define most any problem as being due to a lack of or surplus of government involvement.

Given that the US gov is over $30 trillion in debt, it is hard to justify saying that there has been a lack of government. There’s been over $30 trillion too much government and they don’t appear to have any plans of slowing down.

Re: The planning of U.S. physician shortages (2020)

#127

Post by unnamed76ri »

operatingthetan wrote: post #11
pottertheotter wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s an interesting take.

It's a conservative cliche, except they actively work to subvert the federal government to ensure it becomes true.

You say my comment is a conservative cliche and then type out a progressive talking point. Most amusing.

Re: The planning of U.S. physician shortages (2020)

#128

Post by Retric »

2b3a51 wrote: post #116
whimsicalism wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That makes no sense, if the capital is expensive then you should hire more labor.

UK: there was a proposal to introduce weekend surgery to make better use of operating theatres. The problem is staffing the facilities. Lead times on training people are long. And in UK the training process is not cheap and has significant up-front costs for the people being trained. Nurses as well as surgeons. We used to have bursaries to cover the cost of training for nurses, but, austerity and all.

That seems backwards, unless you also need to be preforming more surgeries and thus need more people. Instead reduce the number of operating theaters while keeping a similar number of people. Net result same amount of operations, but lower capital expenditure.

Of course you now need to pay people more to be working in the weekends, but that’s a different question.

Re: The planning of U.S. physician shortages (2020)

#129

Post by hn976827 »

jimmydddd wrote: post #120
weatherlite wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There's just no reason to do the job when you can get the same compensation working remotely in tech. Looking through the "Who's Hiring" thread is soul-crushing. Physician salaries are the only ones that do not grow relative to inflation and have decreased year-on-year relative to inflation for decades. What ? Most U.S physicians make 300K + after residency with job security set for life. The real bright ones, the…

The job security issue is huge. Many of my tech and finance friends in their early 50's are getting pushed out of their jobs, while my physician friends in their 60's can keep their career as long as they want. A family member recently visited a dr. in his late 70's.

Difference is that in tech you can retire with 50. Few people who still work at 70 do so by choice.

Re: The planning of U.S. physician shortages (2020)

#130

Post by Mordisquitos »

hn976827 wrote: post #129
jimmydddd wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The job security issue is huge. Many of my tech and finance friends in their early 50's are getting pushed out of their jobs, while my physician friends in their 60's can keep their career as long as they want. A family member recently visited a dr. in his late 70's.

Difference is that in tech you can retire with 50. Few people who still work at 70 do so by choice.

So can many physicians. Furthermore, I'm willing to bet that most doctors in the 50–70 age group that continue to work do so not because they cannot retire, but rather because they do not want to retire because they find their practice fulfilling.
Post reply on HN