Time out with T.O. – Dr. Tape wows ’em at Science Cafe

You’ve been fighting laryngitis and you just learned your basement has flooded.

Sounds like a perfect night to try to make sense out of the most complicated subject known to man — health care reform.

Despite the aforementioned personal distractions, UNMC’s Tom Tape, M.D., stepped to the plate Tuesday night and knocked it out of the park. Or — should I say — bar?

Tom O’Connor

Before a standing room only crowd of about 150 people, Dr. Tape, vice chairman of the department of internal medicine, was the latest faculty member to present in UNMC’s Science Cafe series at the Slowdown.

It’s not easy to dissect a 3,000-page bill in 30 minutes. But, Dr. Tape did it in a clear, concise, nonpartisan fashion. He boiled it down in layman terminology, using a PowerPoint presentation that spelled out the key problems of the current health system, the evolution of the legislation, and the key provisions of the new law.

He didn’t debate the pros and cons. Rather, he tried to provide nuggets that would help the audience understand this two-ton gorilla known as health care reform.

Some of his interesting tidbits included:

• The U.S. ranks No. 19 in preventable mortality out of the 19 countries ranked.
  
• The Congressional Budget Office estimates the new legislation will produce a modest increase in health care spending but will reduce the deficit by $143 billion over 10 years.
  
• The average cost per person per year in America is more than double other developed countries.

For Stuart Chittenden, a frequent attendee of the Science Cafe series, it was another educational night at the Slowdown.

Podcasts and more Podcasts of some past Science Cafes and more information about upcoming events can be found at www.unmc.edu/sciencecafe.

“Dr. Tape did a very good job. Those who came in confused probably left with a clearer understanding of the impact of the legislation,” said Chittenden, vice president for the branding consultancy David Day | Associates. “It’s such a big issue. It’s incredibly difficult to get your arms around every single point.”

A huge user of the social media tool, Twitter, Chittenden “tweeted” throughout the evening. In one of his tweets, he wrote: “Just thinking that, whatever your views, you have to be grateful for UNMC’s public service for Omaha through their Science Cafe initiative.”

I’ll drink to that.