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The moral limits to federal funding for kidney disease
The Hastings Center Report
|April 1, 1987
Insights
Congress may reduce funding for the End-Stage Renal Disease Program by cutting inefficient treatments. This approach may delay, but not prevent, withholding essential care for kidney disease patients.
Area of Science:
- Health economics
- Nephrology
- Public health policy
Background:
- The End-Stage Renal Disease Program faces potential funding reductions due to cost-containment pressures.
- Identifying and eliminating inefficient treatments is a proposed cost-saving measure.
Purpose of the Study:
- To analyze the implications of funding reductions in the End-Stage Renal Disease Program.
- To evaluate the impact of eliminating non-beneficial or marginally beneficial treatments.
Main Methods:
- Policy analysis
- Economic evaluation of healthcare interventions
- Review of treatment efficacy and efficiency in renal disease.
Main Results:
- Eliminating inefficient treatments could lead to substantial short-term savings.
- Such reductions may only postpone, not resolve, future resource allocation challenges.
- The long-term consequence could be the necessity of withholding clearly beneficial treatments.
Conclusions:
- Cost-containment measures in the End-Stage Renal Disease Program may have significant ethical and clinical implications.
- Short-term financial savings from eliminating treatments might lead to greater future costs.
- Policy decisions must balance economic considerations with the provision of essential patient care.
Abstract:
In the current era of cost-containment, Congress may reconsider its support for the End-Stage Renal Disease Program. Substantial reductions in funding for this program could be made by eliminating non-beneficial, marginally beneficial, and relatively inefficient modes of treatment. These measures, however, will only postpone the inevitable day when clearly beneficial treatment must be withheld.