Kenneth Lin MD - AHRQ Is in Trouble: And why you should care

The Agency for Health Care Policy and Research is a government agency that does research into finding safer, more effective treatments for many medical conditions. When it reported that the majority of people suffering from lower back pain do not need medical treatment, or prescription medicines, the medical-industrial-complex tried to shut it down, or change its role, or reduce its funding. 

The AHRQ said that OTC medicines were good enough, and that manipulation and gentle exercise was all that was needed in most cases, while getting back to work as soon as possible also helps. Too much rest is not advised. 

For the past 30 years, a little-known U.S. health agency has supported and produced volumes of groundbreaking research on how to make healthcare safer, less wasteful, and more effective. Dubbed "the little federal agency that could," the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) has accomplished this feat with a small fraction of the budgets of its higher-profile cousins, the CDC and National Institutes of Health (NIH).

Nonetheless, its work has often been politically unpopular and unheralded outside of a small community of health services researchers and patient advocates. Sadly, when all medical waste is somebody's income, there is little enthusiasm in the medical-industrial complex or on Capitol Hill in allocating the $3 trillion the U.S. spends on healthcare more wisely or efficiently. In fact, our legislative and executive branches have periodically proposed that AHRQ's budget be slashed or eliminated entirely.

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Kenneth Lin MD - AHRQ Is in Trouble: And why you should care