If you were to redesign the health care system from scratch, how would you design it?
I really feel like much of the medical system is just run plain inefficiently. I hate going to the doctor where they make me fill out the same form every time. I also hate that half the time I go to the doctor, I end up getting sick afterwards from something I picked up while there. I hate talking to my doctor, because he or she seems really overwhelmed and unempathetic most of the time. I don't blame them, I just think they are overloaded.
If I have something minor, like bronchitis or a UTI, what I realized is that the worst part of it is that I have to haul my uncomfortable ass to the doctor, talk to them for 15 minutes, maybe do a test, and then get a prescription or a note to give my employer. I am sure I probably have made other people sick doing this. (As an aside, I always wonder how doctors and nurses avoid just being sick all the time) I end up having to be annoyed for 3-4 hours instead of being home resting. Maybe there is no way around this, but it sure is annoying. They just opened up one of those urgent care clinics across town - maybe that is a better option now.
A national health insurance policy that covers expenses over 10% of your income. In 2013, 10% was roughly the income the average person was spending on premiums and deductibles. This means everyone can afford healthcare for those of us who believe it should be part of the social compact, and there is still incentive to shop around for those of us who believe in the free market. If you want some kind of gap insurance for below that, it's fine, but it's not tax-deductible.
A lot of people trod out the unconscious man rushed in the ambulance as why the free market won't work for health care. Most of health care isn't like that. Providers just compete on things other than price, because most don't self-pay. ERs compete on wait-times (many hospitals have billboards with their current wait-times). Websites exist that have grades and reviews of doctors. Word-of-mouth of who's good. People don't normally end up consuming healthcare with no choice.
People will demand lower-cost solutions to common health issues. Physician assistants and nurse practitioners for colds and flus. Midwives for births. Maybe people will become more involved with their own care of "Do I really need that test/treatment/drug?" And you don't need everybody to participate in aggressive price shopping. As long as some critical mass does providers will start competing on costs.
Expensive treatments like cancer and end-of-life care will still probably expensive. We can't afford the best for everyone. We can either ration it by cost or by some government committee ("Death panels"). Government can't cover everything. Kidney transplant for a 68-year-old? Better be able to pay out of pocket or have private insurance. But I'd hope this plan will bend the cost curve for a lot of medical care and provide some modicum of affordable care for the poor.
Also, insurance is for unexpected costs. Car insurance covers accidents, not oil changes. Home insurance covers tornadoes, not replacing your 30-year-old roof because it's time. Health insurance shouldn't cover well-patient exams, colds, flu, labor and delivery, contraception. Those are all normal things. We're not insuring against them, we're just financing it differently. (This is what vision and dental "insurance" is, and if you look at the full cost of the policies, you're normally not saving much, if any, money.)
Preventive care is not the panacea people thought it would be. If it was, insurance companies would have to be told to cover it. People don't neglect contraception, because of the cost. Condoms are cheap/free. People don't accept some probability of an abortion/unwanted pregnancy because of the minimal cost of contraception. Making the pill OTC is a better idea and would be more effective.
Edit: Re: your last paragraph. My company offers Tel-A-Doc as benefit. You can phone the doctor, and the doctor will even phone in a prescription for you. There are other similar services and apps. Now, we just need an UberPrescriptions.