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One thing I'd like to see addressed is that on average, an uninsured person will be billed $307.00 for the same services that an insured person's carrier is billed $100.00 for. We hold the record in NJ, it's $456.00 for what an insurance company is billed $100.00 for.
The insured and uninsured are billed the same, what you see on your insured's bill is the reduced fee. When you go to your participated doctor in you ins. plan, that doctor had signed and agreement with your insurance to accept less than he normally charges. In exchange, the insurance companies direct you to the doctors on the list. In some cases, doctors have to pay, $1,500 in one care for our office, to be on that list, and also reduce our fees. The uninsured patient can't get that discount, because they are not on the insurance plan. Now I know doctors do charge less is paid cash or pay in advance, which in some states it is illegal and called dual fee schedules, but the uninsured will never pay a reduced fee like $100. for a $307. procedure.
Being wealthy will not save you from Health Crisis
Quote:
Originally Posted by Amaznjohn
As anonymous correctly pointed out, the healthcare industry is not a "free market". Just ask those who spend exorbitant salaries to hire help just to conform to governmental regulations.
No, I do NOT consider healthcare a basic right. If only the wealthy can afford healthcare, then the solution is to become wealthy, at least wealthy enough. The poor DOES have access to healthcare, thus the reason healthcare has become so expensive. They only cannot afford insurance, so they must pay as they go. Get an education, make yourself marketable, and conform to the American culture so that you can get a good-paying job, so that you can afford either insurance or can afford to pay-as-you-go.
Look, if money was the answer I'd agree with you. But I have an education, my husband is a Chiropractor, but I can't get insurance due to a pre-existing condition. I am not the only professional in this situation. One major illness, will clear out my 2 milllion in assets in a heart beat! Lets' say you are a doctor, you have insurance, but you injury yourself sking in the Lake Tahoe. You require a body cast for 3 months, and rehab for 6 month. How long do you think your practice will last if you are not working. Oh ya, try to hire another professional to take over, they want 60-70%, they don't care your ill. Mean time, your mortgage, your school loans, car payment, kids private school, etc, how long will you last. And here is the kicker, your insurance company denies the surgery you needed because you injuried yourself in a sport they consider high risk. Don't think this happens, I know a doctor who had this happen to him. Better yet, the other doctor I know, he died, it tooks two weeks for his patients to leave to find another doctor. What do you think that practice is worth to the widow who had 2 kids. By the way he had a heart condition that was not diag., and he had insurance!
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Barbara Scholz
The insured and uninsured are billed the same, what you see on your insured's bill is the reduced fee. When you go to your participated doctor in you ins. plan, that doctor had signed and agreement with your insurance to accept less than he normally charges. In exchange, the insurance companies direct you to the doctors on the list. In some cases, doctors have to pay, $1,500 in one care for our office, to be on that list, and also reduce our fees. The uninsured patient can't get that discount, because they are not on the insurance plan. Now I know doctors do charge less is paid cash or pay in advance, which in some states it is illegal and called dual fee schedules, but the uninsured will never pay a reduced fee like $100. for a $307. procedure.
The numbers I read were from a Johns Hopkins study of hospital billing, I don't know if that differs from an individual doctor's practice?
If I'm in a hospital bed and I'm going to be expected to pay $4500 for what an insurance company will pay $1000, one thing I know for sure is that it's a greater threat to my health/well being than Saddam ever was.
Look, if money was the answer I'd agree with you. But I have an education, my husband is a Chiropractor, but I can't get insurance due to a pre-existing condition. I am not the only professional in this situation. One major illness, will clear out my 2 milllion in assets in a heart beat! Lets' say you are a doctor, you have insurance, but you injury yourself sking in the Lake Tahoe. You require a body cast for 3 months, and rehab for 6 month. How long do you think your practice will last if you are not working. Oh ya, try to hire another professional to take over, they want 60-70%, they don't care your ill. Mean time, your mortgage, your school loans, car payment, kids private school, etc, how long will you last. And here is the kicker, your insurance company denies the surgery you needed because you injuried yourself in a sport they consider high risk. Don't think this happens, I know a doctor who had this happen to him. Better yet, the other doctor I know, he died, it tooks two weeks for his patients to leave to find another doctor. What do you think that practice is worth to the widow who had 2 kids. By the way he had a heart condition that was not diag., and he had insurance!
Stuff happens. Life isn't always fair and balanced. One can always concoct a situation that would ruin one's life. Sometimes they do happen and we can't prepare for all of them.
One question for you. What happened to the insurance you had BEFORE your pre-existing condition?
I didn't post that you support socialized healthcare. However, you made the comment that Reps aren't concerned. Why would you make that statement? They're concerned, as am I, but the best solution is to let the free market take care of it. Non-action by the government is GOOD.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Amaznjohn
As anonymous correctly pointed out, the healthcare industry is not a "free market". Just ask those who spend exorbitant salaries to hire help just to conform to governmental regulations.
No, I do NOT consider healthcare a basic right. If only the wealthy can afford healthcare, then the solution is to become wealthy, at least wealthy enough. The poor DOES have access to healthcare, thus the reason healthcare has become so expensive. They only cannot afford insurance, so they must pay as they go. Get an education, make yourself marketable, and conform to the American culture so that you can get a good-paying job, so that you can afford either insurance or can afford to pay-as-you-go.
no matter what choices people make for themselves, poverty will still occur because it is a structural condition. if *everybody* made the *right* choices and prepared themselves for higher education, then not everyone would get an education due to the limited supply of education. but let's assume further that everyone in this country is able to and does attain a college degree. everybody's going to be able to find a skilled job that pays well? heck no! some people, who made the *right* choices, will be *forced* to take low-paying jobs because the supply of good jobs is limited. heck, there might not even be enough jobs at all if everyone who were capable entered the labor force. this means that in a free market for health care, a guaranteed fraction of people (demand - supply) who made the "right" choices for success in life get penalized with poverty and no health care.
this situation of overtraining, by the way, has already been a problem in the economy. it started becoming a big problem in the 1970s. now, with only a *fraction* of our population with college degrees, i have several friends out of college who couldn't find jobs better than "admin assistant" (i.e. secretary).
read here an its realy one sentence i react on in the hole tread..
Quote:
I do NOT consider healthcare a basic right
If health is not a basic right nothing is.
If u dont have the right to geet health care u dont have the right to anything.
U dont geet anything more basic than health.
No then how to "fix" ur system well i think u have to make rules for the insurance companies. and continue the system. with some regulations who makes sure evryone has an option to geet a working health insurance.
U cant just set a date and convert the hole system. All u can try is to make the system u have work better. and make sure all can geet insurance. and the insurance shud give good coverage. (like cover serius illnes. accidents even skies,diving etc)
Try not to be a man of success, but rather to be a man of value.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Amaznjohn
Stuff happens. Life isn't always fair and balanced. One can always concoct a situation that would ruin one's life. Sometimes they do happen and we can't prepare for all of them.
One question for you. What happened to the insurance you had BEFORE your pre-existing condition?
I did have insurance for a year because I left work to take care of my children. My husband if self employed, when we could afford the insurance we purchased and initially approved, some months down the road I had a female problem, I went to the MD, got treatment, the my insurance denied because they said a problem I had six years ago, a cyst on my ovary, was pre-existing. The stated my monthly rates we going to triple and none of my female organs were going to be covered in the future! I had the doctor write a letter explaining the how the prior ailment did not relate to the current condition. They insurance reply was that their ruling on my case would stand.
I could not afford the rate increase, and we terminated the policy. I have not had insurance since 1993.
Enough with my sad tale, you still miss the point, but I doubt you will ever get it until something happens to yourself or a family member. It is sad to read so many people not care for their fellow man. What will you all do when the poor is not longer around to pump your gas, serve you food, clean your hotel bed. Is that when it will be a problem? How many Fireman from 911 do you think would have ran to help the victims if they thought like :
"Stuff happens. Life isn't always fair and balanced. One can always concoct a situation that would ruin one's life. Sometimes they do happen and we can't prepare for all of them."
"The following excertp from the poem that was written to help raise funds for the Statue of Liberty pedestal:
Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to
breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming
shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-lost to me
Emma Lazarus, "The New Colossus," 1883"
I guess today we should change it to read :
Give you strong and rich,
Your huddled masses yearning to work hard for good health coverage,
The wretched refuse can run for office,
Send these, the homeless, tempest-lost to another country.
Last edited by Barbara Scholz; 07-24-2007 at 09:16 AM..
Reason: The heading was from Albert Einstein
If health is not a basic right nothing is.
If u dont have the right to geet health care u dont have the right to anything.
U dont geet anything more basic than health.
I disagree. Property rights is much more basic than the right to healthcare. If you consider healthcare a right, why not transportation, or satellite TV? Right NOW anyone can go to an emergency and be treated. Everyone has healthcare, just not health insurance.
Thank you, Tjukken & Chi2NYC! This is my point, Americans have a window of opportunity to effect change. Starting with this election, I not talking one party or another, but lets start asking some of the hard line questions. Who is giving to your campaign fund and how does it influence your decisions? How do you intend to start to fix US healthcare? Look how the candidates answer. Start sending emails to you congress people. Complain to local TV, newspaper, radio talk shows. Why is the tail waggie the dog in the US? WE THE PEOPLE ARE OUR GOVERNMENTS CONCERN, not some Medical Society, Pharmacy Co, CEO of this lobby and that. The govenment was suppose to be for the people and by the people. When did it become for the AMA and by Health Insurance Companies?
Stuff happens. Life isn't always fair and balanced. One can always concoct a situation that would ruin one's life. Sometimes they do happen and we can't prepare for all of them.
One question for you. What happened to the insurance you had BEFORE your pre-existing condition?
Quote:
Originally Posted by Amaznjohn
I disagree. Property rights is much more basic than the right to healthcare. If you consider healthcare a right, why not transportation, or satellite TV? Right NOW anyone can go to an emergency and be treated. Everyone has healthcare, just not health insurance.
You can not just go into an emergency room and get treated! My front office girl's husband had his leg pinned between 2 telephone poles while putting in a dock. No insurance. Went to emergency, asked how they were going to pay, when found out they were not insured, gave him pills took one xray and dismissed him. My husband and I paid for his MRI, his foot and leg were three times normal size, we feared a blood clot, the MRI doc. said there were no ligament were torn, but the most severe muscle damage he had seen. Proper procedure on the Hospital's part would have been to order an MRI, but the xray (on shot of calf) about $100-250 instead of a $1200 MRI. If there was a torn ligament or blood clot, surgery was needed. With out that, he would be one of the poor folks who are now unemployable trying to get on State Disablity. But that another horror story.
By the way, transportaton is free or greatly reduced in some areas of the US for the poor.
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Being wealthy will not save you from Health Crisis
Try not to be a man of success, but rather to be a man of value.
