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EXCLUSIVE: While Massachusetts boasts some of the premier hospitals in the world, it also suffers from some of the highest healthcare costs in America.
GOP gubernatorial candidate Mike Minogue believes that is no coincidence.
In an exclusive interview with Digital, the former longtime medical devices CEO says the commonwealth can boost access, cut costs and reduce regulation through innovation as opposed to government mandates.
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Combat veteran-turned-CEO Mike Minogue launched a Republican campaign for governor in Massachusetts Wednesday. (Mike Minogue campaign)
“I think the most important thing that can help health care is to have a ‘patients first mindset.’ When I was the CEO of Abiomed, everyone rallied around the patients-first culture, commitment and every action.
“Every decision that we took really was focused on, ‘Does this improve the patient outcome? Does this help the physicians and the nurses make it easier to use? Does it help us save money for the system?’”
He cited the weighty regulatory burden imposed on nurses and doctors as part of the problem.
“We [must] have a focus that we’re really going through areas that allow for patients to get access to their physicians, their nurses, and also utilize innovation, things that are breakthrough and things that can minimize the burden on the physicians and the nurses with regulations and documentation.
“I’m optimistic because I’ve seen it firsthand. I’ve worked with healthcare systems all over the world. I specifically know how hard physicians and nurses work, and they’re the heart of that system. So, what we’re going to focus on is a patients-first health care plan that brings access to quality, affordable care.”
Healthcare is a top concern for Bay State voters, and Minogue hopes to use the issue to his advantage in a tough battle to challenge incumbent Democrat Gov. Maura Healey.
He notes that the often stark disparity between healthcare access and quality between the metro Boston area and the rest of the state is a perpetual problem that needs a remedy.
“Right now, if you look at what’s happening around Massachusetts, we’re losing innovation and treatment in areas that do not now have opportunity for high-risk procedures, whether it’s maternity, cardiac or stroke.
“We have areas now in communities that might have a 50-plus minute drive to get to the nearest area. An example is Norwood. The hospital closed. So, if you have a cardiac event in Norwood, you’re looking at a 55-minute-plus drive at best to get to Boston.”
Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey also hosted a news conference Thursday, pushing back on the Supreme Court’s decision. (David L. Ryan/The Boston Globe via Getty Images)
Minogue promises that, during his tenure, he will work to improve coverage and care statewide.
“This is the role of the governor — to provide hub-and-spoke innovation in healthcare for the whole commonwealth, not just Boston.”
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Yet, Minogue argues, the current system poses not merely a geographic problem, but a fiscal one.
“Our regulations strangle the rest of the commonwealth and almost mandate that all procedures are being done in Boston in the highest-cost environment. If you go to outpatient centers and surgery centers, you reduce the cost of procedures, you lower the overhead and it’s a much easier process than driving all the way into Boston. We have incredible hospitals here, but we also have some of the lowest numbers of outpatient clinics and surgery centers as a state. We need to improve that.”
Given his business background, Minogue is intimately familiar with the economics of providing healthcare coverage for thousands of families.
“As a CEO, I bought health insurance for 19 years for my employees. I never saw an increase that wasn’t double-digit every year. … We need to lower the costs.
“We also have to minimize mandating every single treatment and procedure onto every healthcare plan. We need to allow people to have the ability to select what care they want.”
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Minogue believes patients should have more flexibility in choosing their coverage while ensuring families are protected from financially devastating medical emergencies.
“We do need to cap the catastrophic. … At Abiomed, what we did every year is we paid the extra amount so that we would always cap what it would cost the patient. We combined that with a health savings account, which is a great way for people to take more control over their own healthcare plan. Everything that you do in a patient’s first mindset solves a lot of problems.”
With a mental health crisis surging across the state, Minogue has a solution for matching patients and therapists.
“We do have an extensive amount of counselors, but most of them are on private pay. … We don’t allow general practitioners or counselors to get paid outside of private pay, so that’s why most of these patients are going to the emergency rooms.
“It would be simple and more efficient if we also allowed the subsidized government pay to allow those patients to see the same people in the clinics that private-pay people have access to.”
Republican Mike Minogue, with his wife Renee and their five children, is running for the Republican gubernatorial nomination in Massachusetts (Mike Minogue campaign)
Minogue’s plan has specific provisions for addressing an area where the mental health crisis has been particularly acute.
“One of the areas that I’m most focused on for mental health or PTSD is our correctional facility officers in Massachusetts have some of the highest suicide rates in America.
“We know veterans with PTSD also have high suicide rates. These people are all ending up in emergency rooms, and that’s not a very good solution.”
Hands-on experience with frontline healthcare workers is what Minogue believes gives his plan the credibility to set the Bay State on the right track again.
“I’ve been very fortunate because I have a network of physicians and nurses and counselors that have been working with me for months.
“We’ve collaborated so that we can come up with this patients-first plan.
“If you put the patient at the center of that, the treatment plans can be very specialized for better outcomes at lower cost.”
Finally, Minogue has a specific plan to root out waste and fraud, a particularly timely topic following investigations across the nation that have unveiled a costly web of corruption in social services at the taxpayer’s expense.
“The most important thing is to recognize that better outcomes and a patients-first mindset actually can reduce costs. … But we have an additional area of cost savings. It’s called inefficiency, waste and fraud.
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“We’ll identify inefficiency, excess and fraud, and I believe we’re going to find hundreds of millions of dollars in savings at a minimum.
“I’d like to use some of that money as an incentive on outcomes and make sure physicians and nurses can share in the success of improving outcomes. Great quality will lower our costs.”
Minogue won the Massachusetts GOP endorsement at the party’s state convention in Worcester and is widely expected to win the Republican primary Sept. 1 to face off against incumbent Gov. Maura Healey.
