alt Hacker NewsI would maybe modify this to say - there is a strong incentive to be efficient - you only make so much money per encounter, DRG visit to the hospital, etc. So the pressure from "management" on a lot of us clinicians is to see more people per day, make each hospital visit as short as possible, etc. Medicaid providers now see something like 50-60 patients a day because the per-patient visit is relatively low. But there isn't as much incentive for outcomes. I think CMS has tried it in the past, but with varying success. Whether this new mousetrap will work, who knows.
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The existing CPT codes (roughly) pay proportionately to physician time (RVUs). So I wouldn't say there's an an incentive toward delivering care efficiently, but rather hospital management wants to maximize billable hours.
There are a million doctors in the U.S. so if they're each seeing 60 patients per day that would mean that 17% of the population needs to be seen by a doctor daily.
That would put hospitals somewhere between churches and offices in terms of the impact they have attracting attendance.