Liu helps patients stay healthy, live longer, spend wisely

As a physician, Davis Liu ’97 M.D. wants to help his patients to stay healthy. On a daily basis, he helps them make better decisions about their health care and to negotiate an increasingly complex health care system.

“My bias is that the American health care system needs to improve its quality,” says Liu.

“It should be more user-friendly, so patients have confidence when they walk into their doctor’s office or the hospital they know that they are getting the latest care.”

Liu’s book, Stay Healthy, Live Longer, Spend Wisely: Making Intelligent Choices in America’s Healthcare System (Stetho Publishing), provides patients guidance on navigating their way through the maze of U.S. health care by offering guidance on everything from selecting the right health insurance coverage to understanding the difference between generic and branded drugs and the value of body scans and herbal and dietary supplements.

His advice is backed with citations and referrals to the most recent studies by major health and science organizations and includes an appendix of Web site links.

Liu says even with patients today doing their own research about health issues, the basic formula of doctors talking and listening to patients can help ease confusion.

“Patients want to have a conversation with their doctor. They don’t want to be dictated to,” says Liu, a board-certified family practice physician with Permanente Medical Group, in California.

“Patients are looking for reassurance and advice.

Even in the 21st century, the key for doctors still is getting a good patient history. Ninety percent of the time, the correct diagnosis depends on what a patient tells the doctor.”

One subtext in Stay Healthy is Liu’s argument that good health is a person’s most valuable financial asset.

“People don’t recognize the greatest financial asset they have is their earning power. Staying healthy affects that,” he says, noting that a 2004 RAND Corporation study of 25-to-54-year-olds over 10 years indicated that people who reported being in “excellent” health at the beginning of the decade saw their median net worth nearly double by the end of the study, while those in poor health reported a decline in their wealth by 50 percent.

Citing a 2005 National Committee for Quality Assurance Report, Liu says more than 83,000 Americans die prematurely because they did not have basic preventive care for high blood pressure, diabetes and cancer.

“It is a reflection of the health care system’s failure to keep us healthy,” he says. “Until there is meaningful health care reform, the responsibility of what to do to stay healthy rests with the patient.”

— Kenneth Best

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