Ever wonder why there are more and more ads appearing for weight loss surgery? How about those ads for Botox or Lasik eye surgery?

Yes, they are for doctors looking to make more money. But, the really sad part is that the U.S. healthcare system has become geared to push doctors towards providing more elective surgery. Although some biatric and laser eye surgery is medically necessary, a large percentage is elective. Patients can diet and exercise more or, in the case of Lasik, wear glasses. (For the record, the publisher of NetSweat watches his diet, exercises and wears glasses.) But medically necessary procedures are becoming less and less profitable for many doctors.

Consider vaginal birth. Dr. Benjamin Brewer discussed the economics of his practice yesterday in a regular column that he writes for the Wall Street Journal. Brewer estimates that his profit from delivering a baby for a mother on Medicaid is about $300. Two of his partners offer Botox for $300-$500 per treatment. Birth can happen at any time and labor is often a lengthy process. Plus, Medicaid can be slow to pay. Botox takes about 15 minutes and patients pay cash at time of the service. Plus there is less liability risk with Botox.

The economics for patients with health insurance aren’t much more attractive. While patients are seeing premiums and copays rise, insurance companies are nickeling and diming doctors as well. A small decrease (or lack of increase) in payments for this procedure or that procedure begins to add up. Plus, there is the ever increasing amount of paperwork that doctor’s offices are forced to deal with.

When everything is considered, elective surgery becomes really attractive from a business standpoint. No wonder the number of ads for weight loss surgery are increasing.