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Comment by marricks | Hacker News Reader

> I do think we are in a situation where everybody knows that healthcare costs need to come down that doctors and medical professionals are spread too thin

The problem is over optimization AND lack of people. As soon as there's an excuse for less staff because we have "digital record keeping" we're going to have less money and even less staff.

Having in person or remote notetakers is a great entry level job to do before you become a doctor. It could be boring but at least the terms are familiar and you get to know the person you're working with.

It's not like healthcare is an impossible problem to solve that needs more tech, we just refuse to spend money on people and (inexplicably) cannot help but dump tons of money into tech.

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> The problem is over optimization not lack of people or resources. As soon as there's an excuse for less staff because we have "digital record keeping" we're going to have less money and even less staff.

At least in my area, it seems like lack of people is a problem. Sometimes it's lack of people because the pay is too low, but more of it it's lack of people because the pool of qualified people is too small. And increasing pay increases healthcare costs, and healthcare costs are already very high. If digital tools allow the available staff to see more patients while delivering the same level of care (and without burning out the providers), then that means more capacity and less times people want to see a doctor, but can't. Similar arguments for same number of patients ans greater level of care. If it's more patients, but worse level of care, then it becomes tricky.

The lack of people is too low because the organization tasked with accrediting new doctors has a financial incentive to its current members to keep the pool of doctors low.

Holy wow, I meant to say lack of people is the problem. Edited to reflect that.

I don’t necessarily disagree with you here. However, there is a timing concern. Training doctors takes too long and the boomers are aging now.

The best time to fix that was 20 years ago. The next-best time to fix that is today.

But we're still not doing that, and that's a huge oversight. (Or is intentional, to protect the doctor-training to hospital-slot pipeline cartel.)

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