Value, the new medical mantra: misunderstood, abused, and underused

Excerpt

Nowadays it is difficult to attend a medical conference without a discussion of value [1, 2]. This trend to make practitioners and institutions accountable for quality of care, patient satisfaction, and cost represents a historical shift in medical practice. It is nothing less than an attempt to deliver patient-centered care and to empower the patient to make the choice more congruent with his/her desires and expectations [3]. Our publication, the Journal of Medicine and the Person (JMP), is entitled to some credit for this new trend. Since the very beginning, under the leadership of Giancarlo Cesana and Marco Ferrario, the preoccupation of the journal has been to fulfill and promote the mission of our movement. This involves giving a voice to the patient as a person, making sure that the patient receives the treatment that best promises to restore his/her wholeness irrespective of the cost and of institutional and social barriers that may compromise treatment access. At the same time JMP has aimed to dissipate the confusion generated by an increasingly complex medical establishment in the minds of patients and practitioners alike. Thus we could not be happier to welcome this novel approach to medicine and we feel duty-bound to enter the discussion of value in medicine. …