A short profile of Illinois’ Medicaid reimbursement schedules for primary care physicians’ services illustrates what many of them already know: that the road to riches as a physician isn’t going to come from keeping these patients healthy and out of the hospital.

Though payments can vary depending on the service provided, it’s not uncommon for a physician to be paid $25 to $75 for a Medicaid patient’s routine visit. That can be 20 percent to 30 percent less than what the Medicare health insurance for the elderly pays and less than half the $100 to $125 or more a private insurer would pay for the same service.

Lawmakers have to be more proactive with ways to compensate primary care. Instead of telling physicians who specialize in the care of the “whole person” what they already know, how about nipping the hemorrhaging numbers of U.S. trained family physicians and internists in the bud and coming up with financial incentives to get interest into primary care again? | LINK

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