Looking forward to new health care program

[Steven Vaccaro]

Makes you want to be Canadian!

Sign me up for citizenship. Just let me know where the warm climates are in your country?

[sjslhill]

Our town has 38% below $25k income and only 70% have a HS diploma....trust me, everyone does not want to work. I have 2 cousins that don't want to work, they are hook on pain pills. But we are in good hands now with the establishment. Oh, one other thought, most of the countries that have high gas prices have taxes included for other things, correct?

[m4a1usr]

Government HAS to get involved. But not in providing the plans. Regulation and tort reform are a must!

Thats it in a nutshell. Without Tort reform medical insurance costs will continue to spiral out of control. And the regulations that uncle sugar needs to pass should be driven by a National Doctor review board that has patient care at heart. To he!! with insurance companies who make profits at the cost of its customers.

John

[Steven Vaccaro]

Our town has 38% below $25k income and only 70% have a HS diploma....trust me, everyone does not want to work. I have 2 cousins that don't want to work, they are hook on pain pills. But we are in good hands now with the establishment. Oh, one other thought, most of the countries that have high gas prices have taxes included for other things, correct?

I have cousins and closer with the same issues. They are smart people that just don't get it and went in the wrong direction. I'm not sure whats wrong in their head. But they ALL HAVE ONE thing in common, they have just as good a health care program as my family and don't pay a single cent. Not sure where the justice is in that?

[sjslhill]

"You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself any direction you choose. You're on your own. And you know what you know. And YOU are the one who'll decide where to go..." - before thoughts turn to other things, a thought from Dr. Seuss, born on this day in 1904. Happy 108th!

[Steven Vaccaro]

"You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself any direction you choose. You're on your own. And you know what you know. And YOU are the one who'll decide where to go..." - before thoughts turn to other things, a thought from Dr. Seuss, born on this day in 1904. Happy 108th!

Great.

See we can have conversation, without calling people names!

[sjslhill]

Thats it in a nutshell. Without Tort reform medical insurance costs will continue to spiral out of control. And the regulations that uncle sugar needs to pass should be driven by a National Doctor review board that has patient care at heart. To he!! with insurance companies who make profits at the cost of its customers.

John

John, the insurnace companies will soon be gone, bankrupt. The Government will run healthcare like the post office, except it will lose trillions on this one. I have no idea how this will come out. We have a $7k deductable and it's $400 a month just for that. Andrew got sick and we are paying out $5k of it this month. I am thankful that we have the money to pay for it. 80/20 insurance would be $2k a month, so you can see that we are still saving thousands.

[Steven Vaccaro]

Thats it in a nutshell. Without Tort reform medical insurance costs will continue to spiral out of control. And the regulations that uncle sugar needs to pass should be driven by a National Doctor review board that has patient care at heart. To he!! with insurance companies who make profits at the cost of its customers.

John

But why is it that so many others find this hard to see? I know I'm not the brightest bulb, but handing over a few hundred thousand to some lady that puts a hot cup of coffee between her legs from McDonald's is retarded!

[sjslhill]

Great.

See we can have conversation, without calling people names!

[domwilson]

Government HAS to get involved. But not in providing the plans. Regulation and tort reform are a must!

Tort reform is just one part of it. Medical fraud costs were in the neighborhood of $90 billion of so a year...http://money.cnn.com/2010/01/13/news...th_care_fraud/
The industry is so rife with corruption. Doctor's practicing defensive medicine. Neglect, or out right carelessness cost big money. Yes we need tort reform. In addition, we need gross medical abuse or neglect to be criminalized. I was surprised that Dr. Conrad Murphy got convicted. But if that trend continues, Maybe more doctors and hospitals would be more compassionate towards their patients. But in addition, insurance companies would have to take a more hands off approach to how doctors run their practices. No more placing time constraints on how long a doctor can spend with his/her patient. Imagine if doctors could spend more time with their patients. They would be able to make more accurate diagnosis of illnesses. Minimizing needless tests and prescribing un-needed or dangerous medications with dangerous side effects. It's a merry go round of corruption and it is the patients/policy holders/tax payers are who footing the bill for this type of carelessness. Hospitals have the right to make a profit, but not at the hands of hurting innocent people. Insurance companies should have trained physicians on staff, just like they have lawyers, to determine if tests are really needed or are ordered for defensive purposes. Not cold hearted bean counters. If you go to a doctor or hospital, shouldn't you have a general idea of the costs before many services are offered? If you go to a hospital or clinic, shouldn't you get one itemized bill rather than a bunch of bills from different doctors, labs, agencies, etc.? The separate billing lends itself to fraud. How do we even know that a lab performed a certain test, or some doctor you've never seen performed any work on your case? I used to work for a medical billing company, They would bill the insurance twice for the same procedures only they would change the coding and they would also bill the patients as well. So you see, a lot of criminals have their hands in the cookie jar.

[sjslhill]

I have been going to Urgent Care, less than the local Dr. even. Urgent care is a great solution and they have X-Ray, CT, Lab and everything right there. Kosairs Children billed us for $6,100 and found nothing, Urgent Care figured Andrew out for $130. Go Figure!

If people think the Gov is the solution, just look at Medicade and Medicare..... Look at the post office, they lose 1 billion a month. Gov is not the solution to anything but and army and the borders. My 2 cents.

I could go on and on with my thoughts on Education as well.....first thing I would do is open up multiple small schools in local towns and kill the bus service and save millions and have better education. I'd trim the heck out of sports as well, make that into a town thing, not education.

[domwilson]

The govt. certainly is not the most efficient entity. I agree with you there. Obviously self regulation is worse. The government does have a better way of enforcing and regulating the industry. We don't need the government forcing people to sign up for insurance. We don't need the government to tell us which plans we can only accept. For the time being, we probably need them to regulate costs. Medicare needs to step up fraud enforcement. People should not be shut out of getting healthcare because they can't afford it. I propose, if you are in a low paying or part time job, then you should have access to general healthcare. You should have the option to buy serious illness insurance for high cost procedures and services (cancer, stroke, etc.) 3 mos. prior to discovery of an illness. Employers with a relatively high profit margin, with a certain number of employees should provide health insurance. Employers who don't meet those criteria should have the option of paying lower cost, perhaps through incentives, tax breaks, or subsidies for full time employees. Guidelines to reduce abuse by stating you must have a certain percentage of fulltime employees vs. part time. Non of that Walmart crap of a bunch of low paid "Associates" so you can avoid providing healthcare benefits. Small business should be allowed to group together and get large group discounts. People who make over a certain amount, can get a waiver from their employer that they are self insured or have their own insurer (spouses employer, etc.) Illegal immigrants do not qualify for general assistance except in life or death situations. Deported once stabilized. General guidelines what can be charged for insurance premiums and justification if they need to be higher. Serious illness insurance. Standardized rates for charging of services. Up front itemized estimates to patients and tort reform. If you want to sue, it must go thru a third party agency to investigate if there is an abuse before a lawsuit can be filed. In other words, if you spill coffee in your lap, bungee jump, perform jackass stunts, you can't sue. Lawsuits for small or expected scaring from surgeries, you can't sue. We have similar laws for Worker's compensation, auto repairs, labor laws, and other tort protections. Insurers can only make recommendations for quality and not quantity of patients seen. As long as they are positive recommendations. No cutting of services. Itemized Billing can only come from one billing service with the bill going to the financially responsible party and a "advisor" of services performed going to the patient. Unless the patient agrees before hand to be financially responsible for additional procedures and services performed. A federal standard for minimal qualifications so that insurance companies can sell across state lines. A state and federal hotline for complaints and fraud. A reward program for turning in fraudsters.
Criminalizing gross negligence and abuse from caregivers. At which, if found guilty, personal responsibility should pay the bulk of the capped claims. Similarly to if you go out a harm someone, do you expect your homeowners insurance to pay the damages? There are so many things that can be done to minimize government intervention a reduce costs. But it seems that some want to make it more complex than it should be. I don't think we ever needed a heavily amended with earmarks 2600 page bill. I would like to hear others suggestions on fixing this mess.

[domwilson]

http://yourlife.usatoday.com/health/story/2012-03-02/Calif-doc-charged-with-murder-for-prescriptions/53331790/1