How Much Are Misaligned Incentives In Health Care Costing Tax Payers?

On Christmas Eve, I took care of a patient who had just undergone surgery for an infected artificial shoulder. He was to be discharged on intravenous antibiotics three times a day for six weeks. This is a pretty common treatment. Patients are generally able to give themselves this medication with the help of a home care nurse who visits once a week. The total cost of this is approximately $7000 for nursing visits, antibiotics and supplies ($120 per visit for eight nursing visits plus $143 per day for antibiotics)

The social worker informed him that Medicare would not pay for home care nurse visits or supplies. BUT, Medicare pays for inpatient rehabilitation, which he would be eligible for to receive these antibiotics. Given the choice of paying $7000 for home administration versus $0 for inpatient rehabilitation, naturally he chose inpatient rehabilitation...