Martin's Point Health Care Brings Nationally Recognized Health Care Leader to Maine

Dr. Joseph Newhouse of Harvard University addresses a large audience of physicians and healthcare leaders

Martin’s Point Health Care hosted more than 130 physicians, business, government, health care professionals for a dinner seminar this Tuesday at the first of a series of lecture events entitled “Health Care Quality: Can the Quality Movement Cure the Health Care Crisis? at the Portland Marriott at Sable Oaks in South Portland.

Nationally recognized keynote speaker Dr. Joseph P. Newhouse of Harvard University spoke, as did the president of Martin’s Point Health Care, Dr. David H. Howes.

Dr. Newhouse, the author of “Pricing the Priceless: A Health Care Conundrum,” is professor of Health Policy and Management and is also Director of the Health Policy Research & Education Division in the Department of Health Policy and Management at Harvard University. He is also a member of the faculties of the John F. Kennedy School of Government, the Harvard Medical School and the Harvard School of Public Health.

“The most plausible explanation of most of the increase in rising costs is due to the new capabilities of medicine. Aging cannot explain much. A management consultant might say the medical industry keeps developing new lines of business ~ think of dialysis transplants, angioplasty, non-invasive imaging, joint replacements and the entire biotech industry. Coupled with an increase of life expectancy over the past 30 years from 70.8 to 77.2, the demands for these new lines of business in medicine are unlikely to change,” said Dr. Newhouse.

In his remarks, Dr. Howes said cost remains one of the largest healthcare challenges of today.

“We can and we must be smarter about healthcare spending, about how we deliver care. That’s where quality comes in. Recent estimates of waste in our healthcare system range as high as 30 percent or more of total spending. Quality management techniques can improve these and other shortcomings. Quality can also help us improve outcomes and better measure outcomes, and this is especially critical,” Howes said.

Howes explained that Martin’s Point introduced the use of the “Six Sigma” program in their operations last month, one of the most precise and thorough of approaches to improving quality. “We believe that Six Sigma will dramatically improve our delivery of care and services to our patients and members, especially in terms of outcomes and our ability to measure them,” he said. “As a humanist and as a physician, I believe – as I have throughout my career in medicine – that better results will come from better relationships between doctors and patients… ultimately.”

“While there is no single solution to the healthcare crisis, quality management – in both its principals and techniques – provides a portfolio of possible improvements that we can all employ,” said Dr. Howes. “For all of the urgency framing the need to right America’s healthcare system, today’s challenge is not entirely new. It has been developing for decades and, therefore, will not be corrected quickly.”

David Howes, an M.D., is one of the few physicians in Maine to serve as the head of a healthcare organization. Dr. Howes has helped transform Martin’s Point into an innovative physician-led practice, and one of the largest primary care practices currently serving patients throughout Maine and New Hampshire. Martin’s Point Health Care is also an accredited health-care provider for U.S. military retirees and dependents of active-duty personnel.

Established in 1981, Martin’s Point is a not-for-profit health care provider with facilities in Portland, Brunswick and Windham, Maine; and in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. Martin’s Point serves patients in the areas of family practice, internal medicine, pediatrics, surgery, radiology, cardiology, and mammography, as well as other fields. For additional information, visit the organization online at www.martinspoint.org.

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