Originally Posted by DonnaNi4os (Post 2190352)

Teaching hospitals are some of the best. Unfortunately a retirement community that has a population on Medicare will never attract doctors, especially young ones who have enormous debt from their years of medical school. Medicare simply does not pay what private insurances pay for the same services. It is no wonder that residents don’t want to land here to continue learning. It is no difference here than in areas like Naples, etc where most are insured by Medicare. Unless we as a nation work to give incentives to those people wanting to become physicians, the long waiting times for appointments and surgeries will continue..here and everywhere. IMHO

Originally Posted by Villages Kahuna (Post 2190384)

The plan to make TVRH a teaching hospital training new doctors was announced in The Daily Sun over a year ago.

My original post in this tread was not an attempt to throw shade at the Developer. It was UFHealth which withdrew it’s support of the new, larger teaching hospital, not the Developer.

I agree with other posters here—the healthcare problem in the U.S. is getting worse. It can’t improve until we begin training enough new doctors to replace those leaving the profession. Last year 114,000 doctors retired or left practice for other reasons. But U.S. medical schools only graduated something like 76,000 new doctors. The shortfall will have to be made up by doctors trained in foreign medical schools who choose to emigrate to the U.S..

Originally Posted by Quixote (Post 2190424)

How ignorant to describe UF Health The Villages Hospital as ‘not real.’ No, it’s not the Cleveland Clinic, Massachusetts General Hospital (Boston), Mount Sinai Hospital and Columbia-Presbyterian Medical Center (New York City), Mayo Clinic (Rochester MN and other locations); by comparison it’s a small local hospital where I recently took my son for emergency surgery, and the care he received was outstanding.

The elephant in the room is largely unaddressed in this thread; I refer to the insurance industry that has a huge bearing on US medical care. Up north I had two specialists in completely unrelated areas who had both joined existing practices and eventually became the senior members as the older doctors retired.

The one hated so much what was happening with the insurance dictates and controls in the medical field that he convinced his daughter not to become a physician (meaning one doctor less); instead, she went to veterinary college, thus remaining in medical care; and he himself retired early. Before doing so, he had joined his practice with that of the other unrelated specialist to create a corporate structure. I asked both why, and both gave the same answer: to have at least the illusion of having some power and control, since insurance dictates prevented them from practicing medicine as they had been trained. Sad.

Why can one buy the same Eliquis made by Pfizer from a Canadian mail-order pharmacy, where a three-month supply costs as little as $78 plus $10 shipping, while to use our Medicare Part D Prescription Drug Plan one would have to pay over $400? Check it out yourself at Drug Price Comparisons & Online Pharmacy Safety | PharmacyChecker.com. One need only to look at how—and when—Part D was created to realize that it’s a great bonanza—to the pharmaceutical and insurance industries—not especially to seniors.

I’m a dual citizen (US/Canada), and over the years I’ve heard Americans bash the Canadian system of universal health care by citing the waiting periods some have to endure. My Canadian relatives could certainly have afforded to buy private insurance to supplement their provincial plans, but none felt the need to. Many Americans have no understanding of the meaning of ‘triage’—treatment based on urgency rather than time of arrival. Our hospital emergency facilities are treated as primary care by those who are uninsured, and while perhaps an exaggeration (or perhaps not…), it’s been asked in ER waiting rooms (likely not in these words): ‘Why is that possible stroke victim who just arrived being taken ahead of me when I’ve been here for hours with this sprained ankle?’ Am I exaggerating?...

Originally Posted by RedChariot (Post 2190443)

I recently spoke to a young physician at The Villages Health. All the seniors here in TV do the happy dance. You see this as Nirvana. But think of a doctor and his family coming to live in Central Florida. Just think about it. I don't want to be derogatory about this area. There is not a lot for them in our surrounding area. The only plus is the Charter school. Certainly minimal cultural events. He has spent many years and a huge sum of money to end up here? I wonder what picture was painted to attract him here.
Regarding the nursing shortage. I was a Cerified Critical Care Registered Nurse in NJ. I rose through the ranks and was eventually promoted. I was in Nursing Administration for years. There has always been a nursing shortage, but Florida was always worse. Low, low wages, high patient assignments, poorly trained ancillary staff. In 1987 our hospital went to the Philippines and recruited Registered Nurses. Offered them housing, good pay. They had to be fluent in English both spoken and written. It took dedication from everyone for this transition to be successful. And it was. The Philippine nurses saved the nursing profession on the east coast of the USA beginning in 1987.
The powers that be at TVRH need to step up and think out of the box.

Originally Posted by spinner1001 (Post 2190334)

Where did you hear that the UF hospital near Spanish Springs was going to be a teaching hospital?

Originally Posted by jimjamuser (Post 2190481)

Possible solution - how about taking the excessive salaries of the Insurance Companies CEOs and overpaid staff and splitting that up among the young Doctors and nurses to encourage them to work in Fl hospitals and other states where needed? US society deserves better than the current situation.

Originally Posted by DonnaNi4os (Post 2190352)

Teaching hospitals are some of the best. Unfortunately a retirement community that has a population on Medicare will never attract doctors, especially young ones who have enormous debt from their years of medical school. Medicare simply does not pay what private insurances pay for the same services. It is no wonder that residents don’t want to land here to continue learning. It is no difference here than in areas like Naples, etc where most are insured by Medicare. Unless we as a nation work to give incentives to those people wanting to become physicians, the long waiting times for appointments and surgeries will continue..here and everywhere. IMHO

Originally Posted by jimjamuser (Post 2190464)

The WHOLE HEALTHCARE problem could be easily solved by National Health Care like all the OTHER CIVILIZED countries in Europe and Asia. But, then the POOR Insurance executives would be forced to live in poverty........at a lowly $300,000 per year

Originally Posted by jimjamuser (Post 2190468)

Primary education where I came from (up North) was 1st class back in the (literally) old school days. I had a GREAT Physics teacher, geometry teacher, advanced math, and a Spanish teacher in High School. We did NOT have to go to a Private school to get a good education. In fact, they did NOT even exist - only a Catholic high school which was OK quality-wise.

Originally Posted by LuvNH (Post 2190474)

I can comment on bringing in good professional nurses and doctors. My elderly aunt was in hospital and when she found out the nurse was "not white" she would not let her get anywhere near to her. She was not alone in her thinking. Maybe things have changed greatly since that time, but elderly people still have a problem with foreign care givers.

Originally Posted by jfarineau (Post 2190507)

UFHealth never said they were making UFHealth The Villages Hospital a teaching hospital. The initial plan was to build a hospital campus that included a medical school with a residency program and a nursing school in the south of Sumter County. The location was moved to Lake County because of the a major tax increase proposed by the "new county commissioners"....Gary Search and Orin Miller.

Originally Posted by Papa_lecki (Post 2190573)

This, when Sumter county was threatening to impose the impact fee, they moved the hospital into Lake County (see one of GoldWing Nut’s videos).

The new hospital will be a teaching hospital - it will be brand new and state of the art.
And the students will have access to the entire UF health system, including Jacksonville.

Florida is just opening up its nursing licensing system to a network allow reciprocity for nurses - the traveling nurses I know would love to come here, but their license doesnt transfer yet.