NEJM Roundtable Examines Health Care Reform, Economy; Perspective Discusses Online Disclosure Of Physicians' Financial Ties To Industry

"Health Care and the Recession," New England Journal of Medicine: In a perspective roundtable, moderator Thomas Lee, an associate editor of NEJM and network president of Partners Healthcare System; James Mongan, CEO and president of Partners; Jonathan Oberlander, health policy expert and associate professor of social medicine and of health policy and management at the University of North Carolina; and Meredith Rosenthal, an associate professor of health economics and policy at Harvard School of Public Health, discuss how the economic recession has led to an increase in the number of uninsured U.S. residents, which is putting pressure on health care provider organizations. The roundtable participants discuss possible health care measures in the economic stimulus package being considered by Congress, as well as prospects for health reform in the current economic climate. Video of the roundtable is available online (Lee et al., NEJM, 1/22). NEJM also published two perspectives that examine how the economy is affecting efforts to overhaul the U.S. health care system. In one piece, Michael Sparer examines how expanding Medicaid could be the first step in creating a universal health care system (Sparer, NEJM, 1/22). In the other piece, Oberlander examines the expectations about health care reform that face the Obama administration (Oberlander, NEJM, 1/22).


"Online Disclosure of Physician-Industry Relationships," New England Journal of Medicine: In the perspective, Robert Steinbrook, a national correspondent for NEJM, discusses online disclosure of physicians' financial ties to the health care industry. According to Steinbrook, "Concerns about privacy notwithstanding, accurate, interpretable, and timely online disclosures can provide immediate access to potentially relevant information and demonstrate that relationships are not being hidden." He writes, "Disclosure itself does not eliminate bias or conflicts of interest, but it can make financial relationships widely known and be used as a starting point for asking questions," adding, "Disclosures would be most valuable if interested parties agreed on definitions for categories of relationships and payments, uniform approaches to calculating amounts and standards for information to be made public" (Steinbrook, NEJM, 1/22).



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