How to Protect Yourself From Obamacare

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Not caring about the cost, caring about the care.

I understand. 

I'm glad mom's insurance covered her $5,000 trip to the ER for a really bad nose bleed that wouldn't stop.  Blood thinners do that to older people.

[guido911]

I understand. 

I'm glad mom's insurance covered her $5,000 trip to the ER for a really bad nose bleed that wouldn't stop.  Blood thinners do that to older people.

That can be horrific. For today, I saw up close and personal my 8 year old tough out a nasty looking injury, get it surgically repaired, and back home in hours. Hats off to St. Francis and Oklahoma Surgical Hospital.

[Gaspar]

Get back to us when you start getting the bills in the mail.

LOL!  Government never makes anything less expensive. It just makes service and quality worse, spreads out the increased cost, and continues to grow the bureaucracy necessary to increase funding and minimize delivery.

'If you think health care is expensive now, wait until you see what it costs when it's free.' P.J. O'Rourke

[Hoss]

LOL!  Government never makes anything less expensive. It just makes service and quality worse, spreads out the increased cost, and continues to grow the bureaucracy necessary to increase funding and minimize delivery.

'If you think health care is expensive now, wait until you see what it costs when it's free.' P.J. O'Rourke

So you think care by going in to the ER when not needed doesn't spread out the increased cost?

[MyDogHunts]

I understand. 

I'm glad mom's insurance covered her $5,000 trip to the ER for a really bad nose bleed that wouldn't stop.  Blood thinners do that to older people.

My blood thinner was over prescribed from day one and a bump on my eye turned into my whole head and neck swelling up.  Told the nurses I was Tick Man, half human, half tick...

Can't work looking like that.  New job = no insurance.  Thought I was semi-retired.  If it wasn't for the VA care (that everyone in it tells me is so good because of our current President), I would be dead.

[Gaspar]

So you think care by going in to the ER when not needed doesn't spread out the increased cost?

Absolutely!  Obamacare will not change that.  Not one single bit.  The addition of millions (or at least 700+  ) medicaid patients will have no impact on where they seek care, unless you forbid them from using "the drive through" as we used to call it.

I worked in an ER for 6 years, and even people with great insurance used us as a clinic.  So much so, that Dr. Sacra created the St. Francis FastTrack system, which was an offshoot of the ER, designed to be a quick-service clinic.  The cost to the patient or their insurance company was more than double what a visit to the doctor would cost, but that stopped no one.

The hospital will not deny care and medicaid will not deny payment.  They may reduce the amount of reimbursement, but that will only serve to decrease the quality of care and delivery of service.

It's not rocket science.  You can't decrease cost and increase service without creating efficiency, and government is the opposite of that.

Typically liberal ideas invite the need for "reform" regularly and that becomes a never ending trough of campaign fodder for politicians. Obamacare may be the first law I have ever seen were the people who passed it were already talking about reforming it before it even took effect. 

Have you ever noticed how statists are constantly "reforming" their own handiwork? Education reform. Health-care reform. Welfare reform. Tax reform. The very fact that they're always busy "reforming" is an implicit admission that they didn't get it right the first 50 times. – Lawrence W. Reed, economist

[rebound]

Have you ever noticed how statists are constantly "reforming" their own handiwork? Education reform. Health-care reform. Welfare reform. Tax reform. The very fact that they're always busy "reforming" is an implicit admission that they didn't get it right the first 50 times. – Lawrence W. Reed, economist

I just had this discussion related to some of the changes (reforms) proposed for the current farm bill.  (As an aside, while I come from a farm family I do think we need to rein in some of this spending.)  But to suggest that because a program should be regularly modified (reformed), does not discount the need/desire for that program.  Nothing in this country, up to and including the constitution, is static and we are the better for that.  To reform public education is not to negate the need for it.  Same for healthcare, same for Farm Bills, etc.  Change is good, and it would far worse to assume perfection, whether in govt or in ourselves.

[Cats Cats Cats]

Get back to us when you start getting the bills in the mail.

C'mon Michael he can afford it.  Screw the kid who has parents without money.  They sit around a few days to see if it gets better and possibly cause the child life long damage which could impact the rest of his life.  He should have had parents with money and good insurance.

[AquaMan]

St John's, Hillcrest, St Francis in the same sentence as efficiency. That's humorous. The surgical center at the Natalie is great but the hospital isn't anything special. Don't think you're the only person to ever have worked for a hospital or because your daddy was a doc that you have superior insights. My wife and I both have as well as family and friends. They all provide good care, not great, in spite of their often maniacal, greedy, inbred management. The only place run worse than those hospitals in my experience was the newspaper and TPS. Running in some pretty fast fubar company there.

I see lots of really smart people using their education to further their politics without much regard to the logic of their arguments. Thus, the HealthCare act must be bad because of its political nature. Change bad. Maybe that's what makes Tulsa so special.

Government works Gas, in spite of your hatred for it, in spite of its complexity and failures, it works. Its employees move back and forth between government and private enterprise, so if you think they are by nature inefficient, wasteful and incompetent you have to expect it from and blame both parties.

[guido911]

C'mon Michael he can afford it.  Screw the kid who has parents without money.  They sit around a few days to see if it gets better and possibly cause the child life long damage which could impact the rest of his life.  He should have had parents with money and good insurance.

Yeah. Screw em. Because everyone knows in this forum that I don't give a crap about kids. Besides, when I saw my kids mangled elbow and his obvious pain, all I was thinking about was "Gee, glad I have insurance" but not, "These providers are operating like a machine and genuinely care about my child's plight".

[guido911]

St John's, Hillcrest, St Francis in the same sentence as efficiency. That's humorous. The surgical center at the Natalie is great but the hospital isn't anything special. Don't think you're the only person to ever have worked for a hospital or because your daddy was a doc that you have superior insights.

Are you directing that to me? If you are, then there's this as far as what you know about my background, as well as my better half.

[Conan71]

St John's, Hillcrest, St Francis in the same sentence as efficiency. That's humorous. The surgical center at the Natalie is great but the hospital isn't anything special. Don't think you're the only person to ever have worked for a hospital or because your daddy was a doc that you have superior insights. My wife and I both have as well as family and friends. They all provide good care, not great, in spite of their often maniacal, greedy, inbred management. The only place run worse than those hospitals in my experience was the newspaper and TPS. Running in some pretty fast fubar company there.

I see lots of really smart people using their education to further their politics without much regard to the logic of their arguments. Thus, the HealthCare act must be bad because of its political nature. Change bad. Maybe that's what makes Tulsa so special.

Government works Gas, in spite of your hatred for it, in spite of its complexity and failures, it works. Its employees move back and forth between government and private enterprise, so if you think they are by nature inefficient, wasteful and incompetent you have to expect it from and blame both parties.

I'm glad to see you are still a master of condescension, Aqua!!

[heironymouspasparagus]

And I get chastised for thread drift...??

Hmmmm.

[Cats Cats Cats]

Yeah. Screw em. Because everyone knows in this forum that I don't give a crap about kids. Besides, when I saw my kids mangled elbow and his obvious pain, all I was thinking about was "Gee, glad I have insurance" but not, "These providers are operating like a machine and genuinely care about my child's plight".

Thats the thing.  You don't have to think like that. I'm sorry you can't see that not everybody has your means for it not to matter. If you don't have the money to pay for the service then your insurance and how you pay for it becomes a little bit of an issue.

[AquaMan]

No, Guido. I was referring to Gas and his anti-govt views. But thanks for the visual. I'm sure it applies to me on other topics as well!