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Our/Their Health Care

Started by DolfanBob, February 24, 2012, 08:34:56 AM

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DolfanBob

The gloves are off boy's. Let's tear this story apart and show those limey's that we are still the best. Ding, Ding !

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-2105680/This-woman-emergency-op-Americas-hospital-stars-NHS-So-did-best-care.html
Changing opinions one mistake at a time.

DolfanBob

I'm not a big Michael Moore fan. But "Sicko" said it just as well as this womans story does.
Changing opinions one mistake at a time.

AquaMan

Quote from: DolfanBob on February 24, 2012, 08:34:56 AM
The gloves are off boy's. Let's tear this story apart and show those limey's that we are still the best. Ding, Ding !

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-2105680/This-woman-emergency-op-Americas-hospital-stars-NHS-So-did-best-care.html

They also can get rid of leadership in a hurry with a vote of no confidence.

I have a friend who lives in France whose wife is native French. They love their health care as well and he has shared a similar story. His father is a doctor here in the states. We might as well be on Mars.
onward...through the fog

Conan71

$100,000 for gall bladder keyhole surgery???  Holy crap, that can't be right.  How does Cedars get away with that and what insurance company would pay $92,500 of the tab?
"It has been said that politics is the second oldest profession. I have learned that it bears a striking resemblance to the first" -Ronald Reagan

swake

Two very similar procedures, one in the UK costing ~$7,000 and one in the US costing over $100,000!!!

I can't point this out enough. We spend, as a percentage of GDP, twice as much as any other country in the world on healthcare but have almost 20% of the population with no insurance at all. The leading cause of personal bankruptcy is medical costs. 62%!!! of personal bankruptcies were due to healthcare according to a recent Harvard study. And for all this money going into the system we have very middling results, even when you can isolate out issues like obesity.

Out healthcare system is broken. It's all about money and profit, not taking care of people. Obamacare isn't the answer, it is at best a bandaid. Our current system is going to bankrupt us and kill us. We need single payer. We need it now. It works in almost every single other developed nation on the planet and works with far less cost, covering more people and better outcomes. And they don't bankrupt people when they get sick.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2010/06/23/us-usa-healthcare-last-idUSTRE65M0SU20100623

swake

Quote from: Conan71 on February 24, 2012, 11:18:49 AM
$100,000 for gall bladder keyhole surgery???  Holy crap, that can't be right.  How does Cedars get away with that and what insurance company would pay $92,500 of the tab?

My mother passed from cancer last year. Some of her hospital stays blew right by that amount and she was usually only in a few days at a time. That was at SouthCrest. 100k doesn't shock me at all. Costs are out of sight.

Conan71

Quote from: swake on February 24, 2012, 11:34:49 AM
My mother passed from cancer last year. Some of her hospital stays blew right by that amount and she was usually only in a few days at a time. That was at SouthCrest. 100k doesn't shock me at all. Costs are out of sight.

I'm sorry to hear you lost your mother last year.  I had no idea, swake.

I had laparascopic (sp?) in 2001 for my gall bladder.  Total bill was under $10K as I recall.  Shoulder surgery two years ago was $13 to $15K. 

I think either she's telling a whopper on the cost or Cedars Sinai is grossly over-charging their patients.  Hell, it's LA, they probably think $20 for a cheeseburger is a bargain.
"It has been said that politics is the second oldest profession. I have learned that it bears a striking resemblance to the first" -Ronald Reagan

AquaMan

Ha! Sanitation workers in Berkeley are paid $50K a year. Of course their housing is also inflated. Not as much as it used to be but still...
onward...through the fog

Conan71

I'm looking for an email address for the Cedars PR department to get their reaction to the story.  Obviously, they cannot comment on a particular case, but certainly they can comment as to how much such a procedure usually costs.
"It has been said that politics is the second oldest profession. I have learned that it bears a striking resemblance to the first" -Ronald Reagan

DolfanBob

I fell last year and dislocated my shoulder. Went to Saint Johns B.A. emergency. Got right in immediately. It was still kind of new. In pain and unable to write. I was still having to give all the information they needed before anyone would see me.
They were going to get their money or pound of flesh whatever.
The female Doctor was great but not very good at resetting my shoulder. They had to knock me out twice and that was after she pushed and twisted without results while I was awake.

They were literally done with me in about a hour. But the delay tactics used strung it out to three. I swear the place was as quiet as a morgue. I got up several times walking around looking for someone so I could leave.

The bill was this. $75.00 for x-ray. They even gave it to me and it was printed on copy paper. Ah the advances of modern technology. $1.200.00 dollars for the Female Doctor. and $2.300.00 for the luxury suite that I stayed in two hour's to long. I even told her I tried to do it myself on the bathroom door frame like Mel Gibson did in "Lethal Weapon" she looked at me like I was crazy.
As a side note. That hurt like hell. Who knew that it was faked in the movie ?  
Changing opinions one mistake at a time.

swake

Quote from: Conan71 on February 24, 2012, 11:40:47 AM
I'm sorry to hear you lost your mother last year.  I had no idea, swake.

I had laparascopic (sp?) in 2001 for my gall bladder.  Total bill was under $10K as I recall.  Shoulder surgery two years ago was $13 to $15K. 

I think either she's telling a whopper on the cost or Cedars Sinai is grossly over-charging their patients.  Hell, it's LA, they probably think $20 for a cheeseburger is a bargain.

Thanks. It was a long time coming.

I have seen bills as high as 150k for her. Of course she paid nothing out of pocket, she had Medicare and a secondary insurance plan. But the bill was paid, probably not at that initial rate, but something close to it. She regularly saw her GP, an Oncologist, a pain specialist, a cardiologist, a pulmonary specialist and when she would go downhill there would be more. Technically her GP was coordinating her care, but he regularly disagreed with the specialists so the doctors were often working at odds with each other.   We went through a lot of bad doctors too, that spent no time, that didn't care. Just wanted a billable visit. It took time to find a group of doctors that cared, that really paid attention. The coordination of her care was technically left to her, but then she was on so many drugs there were times she didn't know where she was. How on Earth was she supposed to know how many milligrams of this or that she was taking when she didn't know what month it was? The doctors would each order the same  $5k tests as the previous doctor had a couple  of days before, but just wanted their own results. I would fight them on that because the tests would often be painful for her to go through, but I would rarely win that argument. The paperwork was overwhelming. Every time I took her into a doctor's building the first 20 minutes was always in the billing department.

All these new medical buildings and plazas always being built. Usually by "non-profits" that don't even pay property taxes. Doctors driving $100k+ cars. The nurse that takes down your info when you walk in makes twice what your kids teacher makes. Pharma reps whose whole job is to take doctors to lunch make way over 100k, more than a judge makes. It's crazy. It's like with casinos, the money is coming from somewhere. We are unique in the world in making medicine a profit center.

Conan71

That's okay, I was dumb enough to try and get my neighbor to re-set mine.  Wound up at the main campus of St. John's.  I think it was about $2500 or so, same basic three hour ordeal and they knocked me out for maybe five minutes.  Great drugs, but not worth $2500 in 2009 and dislocating my shoulder wasn't worth the dope either.  ;D
"It has been said that politics is the second oldest profession. I have learned that it bears a striking resemblance to the first" -Ronald Reagan

Conan71

Quote from: swake on February 24, 2012, 12:03:59 PM
Thanks. It was a long time coming.

I have seen bills as high as 150k for her. Of course she paid nothing out of pocket, she had Medicare and a secondary insurance plan. But the bill was paid, probably not at that initial rate, but something close to it. She regularly saw her GP, an Oncologist, a pain specialist, a cardiologist, a pulmonary specialist and when she would go downhill there would be more. Technically her GP was coordinating her care, but he regularly disagreed with the specialists so the doctors were often working at odds with each other.   We went through a lot of bad doctors too, that spent no time, that didn't care. Just wanted a billable visit. It took time to find a group of doctors that cared, that really paid attention. The coordination of her care was technically left to her, but then she was on so many drugs there were times she didn't know where she was. How on Earth was she supposed to know how many milligrams of this or that she was taking when she didn't know what month it was? The doctors would each order the same  $5k tests as the previous doctor had a couple  of days before, but just wanted their own results. I would fight them on that because the tests would often be painful for her to go through, but I would rarely win that argument. The paperwork was overwhelming. Every time I took her into a doctor's building the first 20 minutes was always in the billing department.

All these new medical buildings and plazas always being built. Usually by "non-profits" that don't even pay property taxes. Doctors driving $100k+ cars. The nurse that takes down your info when you walk in makes twice what your kids teacher makes. Pharma reps whose whole job is to take doctors to lunch make way over 100k, more than a judge makes. It's crazy. It's like with casinos, the money is coming from somewhere. We are unique in the world in making medicine a profit center.

My ex was an RN and worked as an intake coordinator for a large hospice.  It was pretty shocking to see how many hands come out looking for money when someone is ill and all the fights they would get in with a patient's PCP or specialist because the doctors were worried about losing revenue.

I don't begrudge a doctor for making great money.  

Where I see a conflict of interest is when they become partners in specialty hospitals and owners of expensive diagnostic equipment they are eager to make the payment on and profit off of.  Used to be that a simple x-ray would suffice for broken bones now they want an MRI simply because they have one.  Healthcare sprawl is costly.

My daughter's boyfriend has been accepted into the fall class of OU Medical school.  Due to the current state of disarray in the health care field and future uncertainty, he's entertaining the idea of going into commercial real estate.  His father is a pretty prominent cardiologist in town and he understand's his son's reluctance at this point.

Where you and I depart on philosophy though is I don't know that single payer would be a better solution at containing cost.  The model may work well in other countries, but we have such a great knack for screwing up much simpler things, it makes me leery it would be well managed in the states.

Secondly, we don't have poor outcomes because of poor care.  We have poor outcomes because we have less healthy lifestyles than many other countries.  As one yardstick, take a look at obesity rates of all developed nations and you will see an inverse listing as to longevity.
"It has been said that politics is the second oldest profession. I have learned that it bears a striking resemblance to the first" -Ronald Reagan

swake

Quote from: Conan71 on February 24, 2012, 12:15:35 PM
Secondly, we don't have poor outcomes because of poor care.  We have poor outcomes because we have less healthy lifestyles than many other countries.  As one yardstick, take a look at obesity rates of all developed nations and you will see an inverse listing as to longevity.

I don't begrudge doctors, or nurses making good money. But as you said, some are making way too much money in ways that are don't always pass the smell test. The way pharma reps work today should be outlawed.

Read the report I linked, we don't have better outcomes anymore. Even when you take out general health.

nathanm

Quote from: Conan71 on February 24, 2012, 12:15:35 PM
Where I see a conflict of interest is when they become partners in specialty hospitals and owners of expensive diagnostic equipment they are eager to make the payment on and profit off of.  Used to be that a simple x-ray would suffice for broken bones now they want an MRI simply because they have one.  Healthcare sprawl is costly.

If somebody out there only takes one thing from this thread, this should probably be it.

The irony is that all this hurts doctors quite a bit, too. I've rarely had great luck with doctors as clients. They tend to be very slow in paying their bills. Why? Because everyone is slow in paying them. Why? Because the procedures are so freakin' expensive and the insurance companies fight so freakin' hard over nearly every penny, driving the cost up even further. (oversight is good. excessive oversight is not.)
"Labor is prior to and independent of capital. Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if labor had not first existed. Labor is the superior of capital, and deserves much the higher consideration" --Abraham Lincoln