Is He Worth Over One Million Dollars Per Year?
Stanley Feld M.D.,FACP,MACE
Paul Levy CEO of Beth Israel Hospital writes a blog called” Running a Hospital”. He has tried to justify his salary after the Boston Globe published his salary of over 1 million dollars per year.
Mr. Levy’s statement is a worthwhile read. He is justifying his salary on the basis of revenue generated, and donations received. He is also comparing his job to the jobs of CEOs of large corporations that make more than he does. His justification a well articulated as are most of the comments both positive and negative.
It is bizarre to me to read this kind of thinking at a time when most agree the healthcare system is broken.
Some feel it is about to implode. Paul Levy has figured out how to have his institution survive in a broken healthcare system. I cannot understand how he would have the guts to brag about how much he is worth rather than do something to help fix the broken system. He could hire more nurses. He could provide preventative management care to the community to decrease the incidence of the complications of chronic disease.
Remember, the complications of chronic disease cost the healthcare system 80% of the healthcare dollars spent. Effective disease management using evidence based medicine can decrease the complication rate by at least 50%. The net savings to the healthcare system would be 40% or more.
What about the patients who can not afford insurance? What about the opacity of hospital prices charged for services? Remember Denise’s letter to Kinky Friedman and her problem with hospital pricing? What about the overcharging of hospitals through a faulty DRG system? What about the constant shortage of nurses because of low salaries?
What about the continuing decreases in payments to physicians by Medicare and the insurance industry?
Linda Halderman M.D. wrote an essay entitled “How Much is Your Doctor Worth?”. It is also worth reading. The subtitle should be, “How Much is Your Doctor paid?” The answer after the long essay is $59.50 for this complicated office visit. Dr. Halderman would only have to see 168,067 patients in one year or 744 patients a day to generate a gross revenue of $1,000,000 before expenses.
What is more valuable to the healthcare system? A CEO’s salary based on revenue generated incentives and fund raising or good quality medical care?
Family Practitioners and Internists are struggling to survive.
Some have experienced that their overhead is greater than their revenue. Some have had to hold two jobs. The American College of Physicians published a White Paper declaring that the specialty of Internal Medicine is in grave danger. Patients cannot afford their medication. If they do not take their medication they will accumulate more and more complications of chronic diseases. Complications of chronic disease are good for the hospitals’ bottom line. This should result in more revenue for Paul Levy’s hospital. By his reasoning he will be entitled to a greater performance bonus at the end of the year.
Dr. Donald Seldin, the legendary Chief of Internal Medicine at University of Texas, Southwestern Medical School imbedded in our brains, when we were residents of Internal Medicine, that the practice of medicine is a princely profession. We, as physicians, have the privilege of caring for the sick. Hospital administrators, as facilitator stakeholders, should feel the same obligation. They have an obligation to the community to make medical care available and affordable. The mission should not be to enhance the hospitals’ bottom line in order to increase the performance bonus of the CEO.
Remember hospitals such as Beth Israel Hospital in Boston are tax exempt community hospitals because they have this community obligation. These tax subsides and others tax subsides are opaque to the public. However, the public pays for these subsides. They contribute to the hospitals bottom line and Mr. Levy’s bonus.
Kevin,MD Medical webblog (A wonderful medical blog) picked up Paul Levy’s blog. Mary Lu, a fellow hospital administrator, commented in Kevin’s blog a sentiment expressed many people.
“Kevin, this guy gets the brass ones award for being so forthcoming– It will be interesting to follow how this affects his perception of himself. As a fellow administrator, who is paid a hell of a lot less, I can only wonder what in the hell possessed him to write this. But… it’s going to be interesting!
# posted by Mary Lu : 6:11 AM”
I think you can start seeing what medical care system, the healthcare system, and the American public is up against. Single party payer will simply result in more abuse to healthcare delivery. l
The solution would be easy if we can force the political system to respond with common sense. The logical response does not happen often in our political system.
Patients have to take charge of the system now!! The patients must control their healthcare dollar with the Ideal Medical Saving Account System. I believe this is the only way we can set up a price competitive system.
The politicians will not do it on their own. The political system can do it with pressure from you, the people, on your State Governments.
We have a lot of work to do. First, we must understand the issues.