Sad reading. sometimes im glad im british. our NHS has many faults, but theres no real worries and we certainly wont go bankrupt if we need medical care
Fifty Per Cent Of Personal Bankruptcy Claims in US Due To Medical Costs
by hillary_step 51 Replies latest jw friends
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upside/down
hs- I concur... (barbaric). But never forget $$ is king in our country. We put it's worship above all else, even peoples welfare.
Follow the money...
u/d
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bebu
When you look at what physicians earn, it is affected location: by region, state and even county and city. Here in my little town, the hospital was begun by a group of nuns (who were nurses), and health care was affordable because of their naturally not emphasizing $$$$. This affected the later rating of this region by the government/medicare system; that is, they determined, once and forever, that our county needed much less reimbursement than surrounding communities. Doctors here have been reimbursed at the very lowest rate in the nation by medicare from the beginning, and all of the nations insurer's follow the levels set by medicare for determining the level of reimbursement. This can be a problem if the doctor must spend a lot of time with an elderly patient with many complications/medications. Taking a "regular" medicare patient means s/he will break even; taking a more complex patient means s/he takes a loss.
So, it's very hard to recruit doctors to our town. If they come, they have to work their tails off in order to earn money. They can bill whatever they like, but medicare and insurance will only reimburse them a set amount. When malpractice insurance rates forces them out to another state where it's more affordable, we lose even further. I have to travel 20 minutes to see a family doctor now, because local doctors have filled up with patients from doctors who left.
We have also lived where social medicine was practiced (Japan). If we needed to see a doctor, it was an all-day affair! When I caught a cold, people urged me to see a doctor! Turns out, cold medicine was ALL prescription (back then anyway). Doctors had their own pharmacies as well as clinics and even hospitals. They did as they pleased! I had many doctors for students, and a friend's husband was a drug rep who confirmed my impressons: If any country's doctors lived like kings, it is/was Japan. I can't imagine how much this system was costing the government/employers! I know I did appreciate not having to pay much, once I finally got to see the doctor! (Actually, I have many strange stories about doctors and medicine in Japan. I hope they have made changes since I lived there.)
We also had full coverage when my husband was activated by the reserves a while ago. Living far enough away from the fort, we could choose local doctors (if we lived closer, we'd have to stand in line at the fort for care). This was very helpful, and not having to pay anything out of pocket was terrific. I think this is a good benefit for any military family.
Anyway, now we are back to catastrophic coverage, for over $300/mo. We also keep some accident coverage and disability insurance. (We also have some very rich relatives who would probably lend us $ if we needed it. )
I still think tort reform is a necessary step, but there are others needed as well.
...BTW, Upside/down, there is usually a 9-month waiting period for pre-existing conditions, and after that you would be fully covered.
bebu
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czarofmischief
Yeah. One of the valid arguments against our current system is our health care.
I'm very upset about it. I just don't believe the Democrats when they promise Utopia. But look for Hillary to re-emerge in '08 asa victor because of this one issue.
It's stupid that the Republicans insist on leaving this wide open door to revolution, but oh well, let 'em eat cake bastids gonna git ders soon...
CZAR
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jst2laws
Bebu
Tort reform will also help communities stop the hemorrhaging of doctors who have left the state due to ridiculous malpractice premiums they must pay. I lost my own FP because of this last year, and a brilliant surgeon in town moved out of state last year because her premiums went from $27k a year to $270k a year!!! They rose simply because a frivolous lawsuit was filed against her (and settled out of court by the insurance co., to save court costs).
Here in Florida it is a crisis. The surgeon who added titanium hardware to my son's broken leg told us that an associate doctor would do the follow-up care because he was leaving. We asked why. Malpractice premiums made a medical practice in Florida an unrewarding business. He was joining the Army. He preferred to take a moderate pay check as a VA doc.
The OBGYN's in town made a league and ALL have refused to pay malpractice insurance. They each pay into a fund and every patient signs an agreement that if there is a cause of complaint it will be reviewed by an arbitrator and if damages are awarded it will be from the fund with a cap on each claim. If the patient doesn't like it they can go to another community for care. I am in favor of this because the alternative is there will be NO OBGYN docs in town otherwise.
When Clinton pushed socialized medicine the retort was "Great, government medical care with the efficiency of the US Post Office and the compassion of the IRS." But maybe that worse case scenario is better than unaffordable health care or no health care at all.
Jst2laws
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upside/down
It depends what kind of plan you're on...
but for most "individual" plans there is not a waiting period for a pre-existing condition- it is excluded with a "rider".
Especially "mental illness". Which is contradictory: On the one hand "they" claim that mental illness/depression is one of the easiest to treat maladies and yet (the ins. co. I worked for) WILL NOT EVEN INSURE YOU, if you've EVER been treated for it.
u/d
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bebu
The OBGYN's in town made a league and ALL have refused to pay malpractice insurance. They each pay into a fund and every patient signs an agreement that if there is a cause of complaint it will be reviewed by an arbitrator and if damages are awarded it will be from the fund with a cap on each claim. If the patient doesn't like it they can go to another community for care. I am in favor of this because the alternative is there will be NO OBGYN docs in town otherwise.
This is the kind of solution I ran across while living in CA many years back, during their big health care crisis. I think it is a great solution, actually!
I can totally understand the guy leaving to join the army, actually. During the 18 months my husband was activated, his work day was shorter and the stress level was back within "normal" parameters. He wasn't caught in a vice demanding "purely perfect performance" (avoid malpractice hell) and "work like a maniac!" (to help keep the clinic solvent). (BTW, working like a maniac leads to making mistakes, a catch-22.) He could simply do his best work in the military, and feel satisfied. It was worth the cut in pay. (Now he's working on making changes in conditions in his current job.. .)
Here's a knee-jerk solution at work: Washington state had the "bright" idea of reducing the waiting period to only 3 months back in 1993, in order to help make health insurance available to MORE people. But this resulted in people canceling their insurance, because there was no point in having coverage anymore. People even moved here from out-of-state with health problems intact in order to take advantage of this short waiting period, because insurers were also prohibited by law from refusing coverage of pre-existing conditions. By 1999, all insurance companies, save 2, had left the state, and those 2 remaining insurers REFUSED to take on new customers. We ourselves got caught in this in 1999, because when our insurer dropped and left we had no where to buy insurance, at any price. Talk about a crisis! Washington fixed the problem eventually (can't remember precisely, maybe in 2000). We have a 9-month waiting period again, and insurance companies have returned. (Yippee...)
Sorry to ramble.
bebu
PS: I understand what you mean, U/D. I had forgotten that states have different laws, and was applying mine to your situation--that after 9 months, even pre-existing conditions would be covered (not excluded)...
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Eyebrow2
There is definate need for health care reform here, yes. I was very much in agreement with John Kerry when he proposed that the health plan offered to congressman/senators etc would be offered to the american people as well.
But there is some free coverage here for the poor. Medicaid isn't perfect by any means, but I have to tell you it helped me out a lot when I was a single mother. I have a friend that has 5 kids, and it covers all of them.
My family didn't have health coverage for an entire year because the company my husband work for at the time only paid for his coverage. It would have been $250 PER WEEK to cover the rest of us. EEEK...we opted for self-insurance...as in take your vitamins and don't go climbing any trees. That is a pretty scary proposition with 5 kids, but that is the risk we felt we had to take.
Yes, the system needs to be fixed, but there are also a lot of people that are ignorant of what help they are actually eligible for. When I say ignorant...I don't mean stupid, they just don't know. Many states have insurance programs where you can get coverage for your kids if you make too much money to qualify for medicaide. My mother was able to cover her two youngest children for a few years through it. It was like $75 a month per kid, and it was a great plan. There are a lot of new insurance plan options too. We just signed up for a plan with a high deductible but with an HSA (health savings account). Basically, the premiums are pretty cheap, the deductible is high, but we put money in the HSA each paycheck. If we go to the doctor or have a medical expense, we pay it from this account. The money was put in tax deferred.If we don't use it, it can accumulate for my husband's retirement. For us this option works. His company believe in employee retention plans, and understand that offering good insurance solutions to their employees will help keep them.
I think it is important for employees to voice their concerns as to the plans the employers offer. Some comapnies will listen, some won't.
I don't know if free health coverage for the ENITRE population is the answer though. I think it was thomas jefferson that said that the government with the power to give everything to the people also will have the power to give everything away. I am not a republican, but I do think that the less we have the governement be responsible for our lives, the better off we will be.
What to do, what to do.
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FlyingHighNow
Hillary, I cannot recall the name of the book, I'll find out from Andy when he wakes up in the morning, but it's by two authors and it's about the healthcare cost crisis in the USA. We heard them discussing the book on NPR (national public radio.) The book discusses how the Amercian medical system has been privatized. It's mostly all run as private business now. A lot of doctors invest in those businesses. The Bush family invests in medical care businesses.
Recently it was announced that some high government official in Canada was going to make it illegal for Canadian doctors to cowrite prescriptions for American citizens.This will keep Americans from buying their medication for much less money in Canada.Here in Michigan senior citizens band in groups and go to Canada to buy their meds. It's the only way some of them can afford their meds. The same day of the USA announcement, a Canadian government official announced publicly that George W. Bush has put pressure on the Canadian government to change their American prescription policy. He also said it's because the drug companies are behind it all. He wanted us to know the idea did not originate in Canada.
Basically, the people with the power to change things don't really care about those without health insurance. They also don't care that health insurance policies become increasingly inadequate. Those with the power have the attitude that the poor will always be among us. They refuse to face the fact that without the middle class, those with the power would be poor, too because we support them and their businesses. It's very foolish of them not to want to keep us all very healthy.
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Simon
Coming from the UK it is astonishing to me that an affluent nation as is the US, cannot provide better protection for the health and welfare of its citizens.
Actually, the US isn't an affluent country. It is a country with a small percentage of very affluent people. Citizens of many, many other countries are much better off because they have social and medical welfare that everyone contributes too. A completely private system does not work IMO (or at least the US model doesn't).
The *real* average pay of the average Joe hasn't gone up in the last 30 years even though the economy may have - the proportion that CEOs and the like have taken out has rocketed though.
Ray-gun claimed that a rising tide lifted all the boats but I think the reality is that many just get sunk.
The real problem with the US though is how letigious everyone is and the whole legal system is just a drain on society.