Has anyone gone to any of the minute clinics? I didn't even bother with my kid's pediatrician yesterday -- Usually a 30 minute wait in the waiting room, 30 minute wait in the exam room and finally we get to see the pediatrician for 10 min. Took my kids to the minute clinic yesterday for pink eye -- in and out in less than 30 minutes. And only my son had pink eye at the moment, but she prescribed enough for my girl too... For the same price.
As soon as I get a clean bill of health from my gyn next month -- I'm done with healthcare insurance. They have all the services I need at the clinics around town.
It works in the computer industry and everywhere else it's been tried.
Central planning, "basic benefit packages", and third-party payment result in the sort of inflation we've seen in healthcare and college tuition.
Except that there is a lot of evidence that it does not. As I noted earlier, my brother (a doctor) told me of a study in his area where doctors who advertised lower prices got less new patients (and had more leave) than those who did not advertise or who had higher prices. The unconfirmed theory was that people don't want to go cheap on medical care, especially since it is difficult to compare performance (unlike the computers).
Except that there is a lot of evidence that it does not. As I noted earlier, my brother (a doctor) told me of a study in his area where doctors who advertised lower prices got less new patients (and had more leave) than those who did not advertise or who had higher prices. The unconfirmed theory was that people don't want to go cheap on medical care, especially since it is difficult to compare performance (unlike the computers).
Have you seen the study first hand? And how old is it? Things change and after my experience today with the clinic and last week with an eye doctor covered on insurance visit still cost me 120 out of pocket, I will now go to the advertised cheaper doctor, and let my insurance go. I'm excited... lol Posted via Mobile Device
Except that there is a lot of evidence that it does not. As I noted earlier, my brother (a doctor) told me of a study in his area where doctors who advertised lower prices got less new patients (and had more leave) than those who did not advertise or who had higher prices. The unconfirmed theory was that people don't want to go cheap on medical care, especially since it is difficult to compare performance (unlike the computers).
Wouldn't this be because many people replying to the study are insured, and they have little incentive to choose a less expensive health care option?
Some of the alternate plans proposed by other private entities suggested putting health care and coverage in the hands of the consumer, with incentives to the consumer if they save money.
On a different note:
I attended a meeting Monday on health care issues, hosted by my company. One of the doctors brought up an interesting point. People will often say that malpractice claims are only a small percentage of health care costs in this country. He said that the AMA was very political, but many of its members would support some government analysis that said that the extra tests and measures taken to avoid malpractice claims is estimated to cost half a trillion dollars annually in the country. He also said that Howard Dean was honest enough to admit that the congressmen behind the health care law did not even try to touch this because lawyers are some of their largest political contributors. I couldn't verify these comments made, but would be curious to find out what kind of burden is placed on the industry for unnecesary procedures, whether for legal fears or just to follow obsessive protocols.
Wouldn't this be because many people replying to the study are insured, and they have little incentive to choose a less expensive health care option?
Some of the alternate plans proposed by other private entities suggested putting health care and coverage in the hands of the consumer, with incentives to the consumer if they save money.
The study my brother mentioned was about three years old (and over a three year period). I have not seen it first hand, but since it directly affects my brother, I have no reason to doubt him. His practice seriously looked at it, because they were considering whether to advertise their prices. He did note that this affect occured even for consumers with high-deductable plans, where they were expected to pay larger amounts. His specialty (which was part of the study) is not typically emergency, so consumers have much greater opportunities to get referrals, information about the doctors and generally shop around. One area he did note did well for price advertising was in drugs and equipment.
This is not to say that competition could not improve things. Rather, it is a complicated market with real barriers to information sharing and cost comparison. I think it is somewhat silly to compare it to consumer electronics.
Except that there is a lot of evidence that it does not. As I noted earlier, my brother (a doctor) told me of a study in his area where doctors who advertised lower prices got less new patients (and had more leave) than those who did not advertise or who had higher prices. The unconfirmed theory was that people don't want to go cheap on medical care, especially since it is difficult to compare performance (unlike the computers).
Who paid for the study?
BTW - people have a right to pay more if they wish.
Right now, they have few - if any - choices at all.
AND - all the government "solutions" involved less and less choice for individuals.
I truly would not want to go to the "cheapest" doctor in town.
I'll buy the cheapest peanut butter, the cheapest ketchup, the cheapest bologna - but some things I want to KNOW I'm getting value and quality - which usually means you pay a higher price.
And after the experience with my Ex - I am now very weary of doctor's who do much advertising. The best doctors rarely lose patients and get most of their business by word of mouth.
Maybe I'm not the "target" audience here though - since I'm insured and I don't price shop when it comes to doctor's services. I do - however - always insist on using generic medicines when available.
The primary cause of the Health Care Crisis is modern American divorce law.
Doctors and other health-care professionals spend the entirety of their early adulthood preparing for the competitive careers they will eventually enjoy. Although their motivations may initially have been largely altruistic, deriving from a desire to heal and serve humanity, they nonetheless ultimately find themselves locked into a high-cost lifestyle which they are powerless to change.
By the time they realize what has happened to them, and that their wives can divorce them at any time and take the house, the kids, alimony and half of everything else they have, it is too late. These professionals must then relentlessly continue to increase their incomes, in order to assure that their wives stay happy and are not tempted to file against them, at all costs. Unfortunately these “costs“ must ultimately be borne by patients!
The primary cause of the Health Care Crisis is modern American divorce law.
Doctors and other health-care professionals spend the entirety of their early adulthood preparing for the competitive careers they will eventually enjoy. Although their motivations may initially have been largely altruistic, deriving from a desire to heal and serve humanity, they nonetheless ultimately find themselves locked into a high-cost lifestyle which they are powerless to change.
By the time they realize what has happened to them, and that their wives can divorce them at any time and take the house, the kids, alimony and half of everything else they have, it is too late. These professionals must then relentlessly continue to increase their incomes, in order to assure that their wives stay happy and are not tempted to file against them, at all costs. Unfortunately these “costs“ must ultimately be borne by patients!
Really Galt? It's pretty evident you want marriage abolished. But to blame this whole healthcare mess on wives divorcing their husbands? That's a little bit of a stretch, in my humble opinion :/ Posted via Mobile Device
But only until the "public option" for health insurance is adopted and firmly implemented, the status quo will reign supreme; massive numbers of people who are denied coverage until after 2014 for "pre-existing conditions," insurance rates that are unconsciably ill-affordable with deductibles that make having health insurance unpalatable.
Public option would allow the government to procure at least the same, if not better rates than what federal government employees already receive, thereby forcing the private insurance companies to compete with those rates. Ergo, the gargantuan profit margins by those companies would be vastly depleted, thereby making the health care professionals start walking in lock-step with the insurance providers in the adjustment of their costs and charges. If a person wanted more than the mandated coverage, they could certainly pay for the applicable premiums and tack it on to their policy.
But the insurance, the corporate, and the doctor's lobby will have no part of this while cowardly hiding under the umbrella of the "free enterprise" and "lassiez fair" arguments of free business, busily defending that they have the greater right to justify their heinous profit margins and salaries and simultaneously keep the government from regulating their sordid affairs, as opposed to having to provide decent affordable health care for all Americans.
It really makes me wonder what side of this issue that God would choose to side with!
But only until the "public option" for health insurance is adopted and firmly implemented, the status quo will reign supreme; massive numbers of people who are denied coverage until after 2014 for "pre-existing conditions," insurance rates that are unconsciably ill-affordable with deductibles that make having health insurance unpalatable.
Public option would allow the government to procure at least the same, if not better rates than what federal government employees already receive, thereby forcing the private insurance companies to compete with those rates. Ergo, the gargantuan profit margins by those companies would be vastly depleted, thereby making the health care professionals start walking in lock-step with the insurance providers in the adjustment of their costs and charges. If a person wanted more than the mandated coverage, they could certainly pay for the applicable premiums and tack it on to their policy.
But the insurance, the corporate, and the doctors lobby will have no part of this while hiding under the umbrella of the "free entrerprise" and "lassiez fair" arguments of free business, busily defending that they have the greater right to justify their heinous profit margins and salaries as opposed to having to provide affordable health care for all Americans.
It really makes me wonder what side of this issue that God would choose to side with!
And this is part of the reason I love coming here . I just got the cliff notes version of public option . Thanks!
And what you mention about the deductible situation, exactly why I'm opting out of insurance coverage during open enrollment. I will start using eye doctors I hear about through advertising, or I will go to whichever clinic is more affordable... Kind of like how my grandpa did it. Posted via Mobile Device
I'm opting out of insurance coverage during open enrollment. I will start using eye doctors I hear about through advertising, or I will go to whichever clinic is more affordable... Kind of like how my grandpa did it.
That’s even a more foolish comment than the one you made in reply to my last.
In “Grandpa’s time” this country was still enjoying the wave of prosperity which followed the Second World War. Labor unions were still strong, with the supply of health benefits by all employers considered standard. Health care had not yet become “securitized”, with wall street not yet having discovered how to convert individual doctors, hospitals and drug companies into “big medicine” and “big pharma”. This had not yet become possible because Reagan’s deregulation mania had not yet occurred and there were many regulations on what claims could be made for new meds as well as what was considered ethical for doctors and hospitals to claim and to charge. Doctors and other health professionals did not need to worry about keeping their wives sufficiently satisfied, financially, in order that they would not file for divorce, because the supremely stupid and greedy idea of “no-fault” divorce had not yet emerged.
Today you can take a prescription drug, prescribed by a “doctor” who was paid by the drug company to give it to you---even though there is really no such condition as the one for which you are being “treated”---and with said doctor really only an imposter of a real doctor with the same name. You can then be admitted to a hospital, for reactions to the drug, which is part of the same wall-street traded “medical group“ as the clinic where you went. There they will only pretend to treat you and will then bill the insurance company---or the government---a fortune.
If, for any reason, you are admitted to a hospital with serious problems but don’t have insurance, they will only “stabilize” you and kick you out of the door full of enough pain killing injections to paralyze a horse. You will then, shortly, be admitted to another emergency room where the same process will be repeated. This will continue, ad infinitum, until you die from either the condition or the “treatments“. If you live long enough you will eventually receive bills totaling into the million$ for both real and imaginary items, and with hospital room rates calculated at a rate beginning at $25,000.00 per night.
I ask anyone: with a :“health industry” rife with so much greed, dishonesty and corruption, how could there not be a Health Care Crisis?? .
That’s even a more foolish comment than the one you made in reply to my last.
In “Grandpa’s time” this country was still enjoying the wave of prosperity which followed the Second World War. Labor unions were still strong, with the supply of health benefits by all employers considered standard. Health care had not yet become “securitized”, with wall street not yet having discovered how to convert individual doctors, hospitals and drug companies into “big medicine” and “big pharma”. This had not yet become possible because Reagan’s deregulation mania had not yet occurred and there were many regulations on what claims could be made for new meds as well as what was considered ethical for doctors and hospitals to claim and to charge. Doctors and other health professionals did not need to worry about keeping their wives sufficiently satisfied, financially, in order that they would not file for divorce, because the supremely stupid and greedy idea of “no-fault” divorce had not yet emerged.
Today you can take a prescription drug, prescribed by a “doctor” who was paid by the drug company to give it to you---even though there is really no such condition as the one for which you are being “treated”---and with said doctor really only an imposter of a real doctor with the same name. You can then be admitted to a hospital, for reactions to the drug, which is part of the same wall-street traded “medical group“ as the clinic where you went. There they will only pretend to treat you and will then bill the insurance company---or the government---a fortune.
If, for any reason, you are admitted to a hospital with serious problems but don’t have insurance, they will only “stabilize” you and kick you out of the door full of enough pain killing injections to paralyze a horse. You will then, shortly, be admitted to another emergency room where the same process will be repeated. This will continue, ad infinitum, until you die from either the condition or the “treatments“. If you live long enough you will eventually receive bills totaling into the million$ for both real and imaginary items, and with hospital room rates calculated at a rate beginning at $25,000.00 per night.
I ask anyone: with a :“health industry” rife with so much greed, dishonesty and corruption, how could there not be a Health Care Crisis?? .
Galt -- I suspect you come here to just start problems, but I'll humor you.
My gramps was a landowner, he didn't work for anyone or anything much of his life He just went to the clinic down the road when he got sick, kind of like the Walgreens minute clinics that exist now.
As for being treated in the ER without insurance, that's been covered in this thread several pages back, in that no one can be turned away for treatment if they go the ER. And you know what about the cost? I filed BR this year, so even with full on health insurance, the healthcare costs over the past several years --- twin birth, stroke, continued heart treatment --- The costs contributed to our bankruptcy filing.. So what might happen if we get a 20K hospital bill? Well, they have to accept whatever we can pay them over time -- can't get blood from a turnip, can you?
I don't think anyone in this thread has said anything "foolish"... We are all pretty agitated at the current state of our healthcare crisis and bouncing ideas around. No need to jump in here and start calling names sweetheart.
32Likes
Re: Any thoughts on the health care crisis? 
. I just got the cliff notes version of public option 
He just went to the clinic down the road when he got sick, kind of like the Walgreens minute clinics that exist now. 
