[MarkMc]

(Sorry for delay - I just read your reply)

As someone who had a serious illness last year and who is not in the top 1%, I can promise you I would have crawled over broken glass if I thought it would have improved my chance of survival. I certainly would have paid a large chunk of my net worth to switch to a doctor who had a significantly better track record.

I don't understand why the medical insurance market wouldn't work. If the insurance company won't let me switch to a doctor who has a better track record, won't that insurance company get a bad reputation and lose business? U.S. doctors have a better reputation than Mexican doctors and in this case most people pay for insurance which covers treatment by the more reputable doctor - I imagine the same effect would apply between doctors within the US if there were a objective track record which identifies the better-performing doctors.