Hear what physicians are saying—in their own words.

Thousands of physicians on Sermo are speaking out on healthcare reform. Their concerns and experiences are adding great depth to the debate. Read the comments below to gain perspective on the issues and see what’s on everone’s mind.

Family Practitioner

What we need are cost reductions in our overhead and fair reimbursement, otherwise cash only and or micropractice is the only viable future

Anesthesiologist

...without issues such as tort reform, insurance industry reform, ‘patient responsibility’, and prudent, physician-driven assessments of costly new technologies through the lens of solid outcomes studies, simply reducing physician salaries even further will only drive this country’s healthcare system toward a significant reduction in quality. American physicians, collectively, can neither work much harder or longer, nor withstand more financial hardships...

Endocrinologist

...private insurers must be somehow forced to engage in real negotiations with doctors, as well as be transparent with their members. I just got a letter from Aetna - they are increasing my premium cost and my copay amounts - first time I have seen this - and there is no way for me to ask them for a specific reason. If this type of highway robbery continues, a public option begins to look more attractive

Emergency Medicine Specialist

Realistically, we are going to add 40-50 million people to the mix, at the same time that we are cutting Physician reimbursement. Unless there is an indentured servitude amendment buried deep in this bill, I wonder where the Primary Care Doctors to take care of this population is magically going to come from.

Internist

Any health care reform which does not address malpractice reform, insurance reform, patient responsibility, will not be worthy to be called as reform.

Family Practitioner

...people bring up the fact that the AMA is “with” Obama. They are shocked to find out that we have never been members and that the AMA was never really formed to represent doctors. And they do not represent most of us.

Anesthesiologist

Besides the misguided attempts of the AMA to give their input, have doctors, other than Rahm Emanuel’s brother been asked their opinions? Seems to me, the best way to reduce cost is to work with the people who can prescribe the treatments