In a NEJM Catalyst video and text piece, Stephen Swensen, M.D., of the Mayo Clinic College of Medicine, talks about what medicine would look like if patients designed it. Dr. Swensen is a Senior Fellow of the Institute for Healthcare Improvement.

Among his remarks:

“Our health care system has 40% waste by the most conservative estimates, and the top three categories of waste we own: overtreatment, failures of care delivery, failures of care coordination,” and he warns of the danger of being driven by financial considerations.

“Not only is putting patients’ interest first in the patient’s best interest, but it’s in ours. If you look at drivers of {physician} burnout, one of the drivers is moral distress, and a values dissonance. So not only is it good for patients to put their interests first, it’s good for us.”

To read/hear the package, please hit this link.