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New Health Report: More Prevention and Early Treatment

Montpelier, Vermont - September 28, 2009

A new healthcare report card on Vermont finds there needs to be more focus on prevention and early treatment when it comes to chronic diseases.

About half of Vermonters have a chronic illness like diabetes or heart disease, and treating those ongoing medical conditions takes up three-quarters of our health care dollars, but a new survey finds only half of those patients get the recommended care they need.

"We must get people sooner through prevention, early treatment and intervention," said Helen Riehle of Vermont Program for Quality in Health Care.

The Vermont Program for Quality in Health Care released its 13th annual report that backs up what's beginning to be common knowledge. The independent non-profit says preventing and treating chronic illness is key to making people healthier, and eventually lowering health care costs. But the current health care system pays more for procedures like amputation instead of preventive care.

"The system that we have is designed for acute care so people have an illness they hurt, they have a symptom, they come to the system, but chronic illness is not that way. If you have high blood pressure, if your sugars are high, it doesn't hurt you until the condition is quote advanced," said medical director Dr. Cyrus Jordan.

There are five chronic care projects around Vermont working to change care by educating patients about the disease and insuring regular check ups. The study finds it takes about three years for a doctor's office to transition to be more proactive.

"It is not rocket science, but it adresses a real deficiency in our system," said Dr. John Matthew of the Plainfield Health Center.

The latest is in Central Vermont. The hospital is about to start a chronic care project in November.

"Then there is a thing called doc site, and it will generate a reminder that somebody needs a visit, a little program of you've done this but need to do this at the next visit," said Matthew.

The report comes out as Congress is debating health care. It is expected that a bill could include setting up several pilot projects, that reimburse providers for keeping patients healthy  as opposed to treating side affects.

The report finds that Vermont is strong at end-of-life care. Older patients here are less likely to use expensive hospital care  and instead use home health or a nursing home.

You can link to the full report, click on the link above. 

Kristin Carlson - WCAX-TV