Health Care

I just spoke with RI health insurance commissioner Christopher Koller, who shared a repeat-worthy fact, and I quote:

Primary care is the only part of our delivery system where the more we have, the lower our overall costs are. We can’t say that about anything else. And yet, historically, we’ve only spent six percent of our dollars on primary care.

States that have chosen to make their own online marketplaces for health insurance are moving ahead, some more quickly than others. And there’s no time to lose: these exchanges have to come online in 2014, under the Affordable Care Act timeline. (Here’s an update on where states are with their exchanges.)

Welcome! We're launching a new series here on Rhode Island Public Radio. It's called Future Docs. Part one airs October 3, 2012. But there's much more right here, online.

We hope you'll visit this site often to keep up to date on Future Docs and join the conversation. Feel free to:

From Rhode Island Public Radio, Future Docs is a radio and online documentary project that follows the experiences of medical students and residents as they become doctors. They are our “Future Docs.” Our key question: what’s it like to become a doctor today in Rhode Island, and how is that changing? Along the way, we’re talking to experts, analyzing relevant news, and looking beyond Rhode Island’s borders to create a richer picture of doctor education today.

Peter Kaminski

In his words: The son of Polish refugees who left the country during the Cold War, I was born in Idaho in 1988 but I’ve spent most of my life growing up in Acton, Massachusetts. After high school I attended college at the University of Massachusetts in Amherst, earning a bachelors degree in Microbiology and Public Health while working as an Emergency Medical Technician.