North Carolina’s certificate-of-need law artificially inflates health care costs by limiting competition in provision of health care services. That’s the assessment of an orthopedic surgeon who spent a decade on the state board that oversees the CON process.
Dr. Richard Bruch, now a consultant and registered lobbyist for Triangle Orthopaedic Associates, discussed specific CON cases affecting his independent physician practice during a speech Monday to the John Locke Foundation’s Shaftesbury Society. Bruch also spelled out the CON process and detailed the thousands of dollars of costs tied to each step in that process. His speech was linked to JLF’s participation in Health Care Solutions Week.
In the video clip below, Bruch explains why free-market-oriented Republicans who have taken over the legislative and executive branches of North Carolina government have done little to reform CON’s costly problems.
Click here to watch the full 48:01 speech.