Reps, Lawyers, Bureaucrats – What’s the Biggest Problem?

Ed Silverman over at Pharmalot wrote up a quick post on the cost (to doctors) of spending time with drug reps.

You can read the full article here – the bottom line of the calculation was that, on average, a doc may save about 1 hour per week by not saving reps, thereby saving perhaps $6,000/year.

OK – 50 hours, 6K.

Now, let’s think about how much of a doctor’s time is flushed down the drain because of the ridiculous amount of paperwork, follow-up, and cost due to government regulation, HMO/insurance procedures, malpractice insurance, and all the other nonsense that sucks away the lifeblood of a physician’s practice.

Where’s the real threat to how we practice medicine? And how come there isn’t more outcry about Big Government and Big Tort Law? The lawyers don’t even give away free pens.

Just asking…