Improving Medical Care, at Lower Cost?

A few changes could improve common medical practice, and save money, too, a group of doctors says. The advice comes from the National Physicians’ Alliance. A group of alliance members came up with “Top Five” lists of ways to improve primary care while reducing costs. The lists covered family medicine, internal medicine and pediatrics. All of the advice is based on published evidence. But not everyone follows it now. Two of the lists overlapped. They said no imaging tests should be done for back pain for at least six weeks. They recommended no routine heart tests for low-risk patients without symptoms. They also said to reserve routine bone density tests for women 65 or older. Men should be 70 or older with high fracture risk. One list recommended generic drugs to lower cholesterol.