Proponent testimony by

Mary Jo Welker, M.D.

Chair, The Ohio State University Department of Family Medicine

Member, American Academy of Family Physicians Board of Directors

House Bill 666

Physician Self-Referral

House Health and Family Services Committee

Wednesday, December 4, 2002

 

 

Chairman Jolivette, members of the House Health and Family Services Committee, thank you for the opportunity to speak in support of House Bill 666, the measure being considered to extend state law on physician conflict of interest to inpatient hospitals.

 

I appear before you today, at least in part to make sure you know that there are doctors who support this legislation. As a family physician and as an educator of young doctors, I am confident that people enter our profession for only the best reasons. They want to provide the best care to their patients and make positive differences in the lives of those they heal. It’s a higher calling; one that requires ethical and moral decision-making every single day.

 

I teach my students that what is good for the patient is paramount. Nothing else can or should compete with it. It is at the very least, naïve to think that if a profit motive is involved it has no influence on patient care. It does. And from my personal viewpoint, it is morally wrong to profit from patients’ ailments.

 

It’s not an easy time for anyone directly involved with health care delivery. Doctors, like many other professionals, are feeling the pressure of significantly higher education debt loads and some stagnation of their earning ability. It’s understandable, given the deregulation of the hospital industry that some doctors would try to take advantage of the opportunity to earn more in a for-profit health facility in which they are investors. It doesn’t make it the right thing to do, however, for patients.

 

No one is contending that physicians can’t make ethical decisions. No one is interested in denying doctors the opportunity to be highly compensated for the important service they provide. No one wants to unduly limit the freedom to practice medicine in the very best of circumstances. But our knowledge of human nature and good common sense tell us that, when a conflict exists between making a profit and delivering health care, some patients will suffer. Conflict of interest provisions occur in many businesses and professions. In medicine, where lives are at stake, they are critical.

 

If all physicians’ motives were truly altruistic – delivering the best patient care in the best possible environment – why, for instance, was the New Albany Surgical Hospital not proposed as a not-for-profit facility?  If these kinds of conflicts are allowed to exist, what kind of message are we sending to the young doctors we teach? And, more importantly, perhaps, those people we care for?

 

The bill that you are now considering merely extends the intent of the law now in place to remove certain self-referral conflicts of interest from consideration. When passed, it will make my job and that of other physicians easier as well. It’s a narrow way to proactively address a situation that has the potential to cause great harm.

 

The proliferation of boutique hospitals brings with it a whole host of additional challenges that we must yet deal with. Passage of this legislation will solve one of the most critical issues at the core of the larger debate. With the profit motive removed, we can be assured that patient care will continue to come first. The peace of mind that will bring to me, and to my patients and students, is welcome.

 

Mr. Chairman, members of the Committee, thank you again for the opportunity to speak in support of House Bill 666. I would be happy to answer any questions you may have.