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Cities with Uber Have Lower Rates of Ambulance Usage

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Re: Cities with Uber Have Lower Rates of Ambulance Usage

#111

Post by lostlogin »

rectangletangle wrote: post #96
throwaway0255 wrote: post #48

I injured myself and needed to go to the ER. The injury wasn't life threatening, but I definitely needed to go to the hospital immediately. I called an Uber. I don't have the time or expertise to do the months of legalese and calculus it would take me to understand my insurance policy, so I have no idea how much an ambulance ride would have cost me. $0? $400? $15000? None of those numbers would surprise me. As best I…

Similar story; dislocated my shoulder, and needed to visit the ER. Came to the same conclusion at the time, that Uber would be the cheaper/easier option. The driver got me safely to the ER, likely faster than an ambulance would have. The driver was even courteous enough to help me with the door. I don't remember the exact price, but it was reasonable, I'm sure it probably saved me hundreds relative to an ambulance ri…

If it’s anything like the taxi drivers here in Auckland, you have a fair chance of getting a driver with some sort of medical qualification too.

Re: Cities with Uber Have Lower Rates of Ambulance Usage

#112

Post by djsumdog »

Malician wrote: post #75
ajasmin wrote: post #70

How is Uber any different than taking a taxi to the hospital?

If Uber says 5 minutes, it might be 7, or even possibly 15 if things go very, very wrong. Heck, if it's gonna be 15 you know this ahead of time because you can see the driver making wrong turns. If you call a taxi service, and they say "15 minutes," it could be 30, 45, or 60. Maybe they're mussing with the truth, maybe they're outright lying. You don't know, and without the map showing the driver, you have no way of…

A lot of modern taxi services have apps (often written by just a few big shops and contracted/branded out, but still). So you can start to get some of the same assurances from Taxis that you could get from Uber.

Also even before Uber/apps, I never had a problem with calling a Taxi and it not showing up within a few min, and I've lived a lot of places.

Re: Cities with Uber Have Lower Rates of Ambulance Usage

#114

Post by kelnos »

switch007 wrote: post #17
adventured wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are a lot of private ambulance services in the US, they're anything but unregulated though as you'd expect with anything in the US medical field (one of the most regulated industries on earth). There's no theoretical reason why Uber couldn't get into the driving side of the business, with human drivers. Their future is in autonomous however, which will never be the ambulance business (it will never be autonomou…

> It will never be autonomous, ambulance drivers frequently have to break standard driving laws in emergencies, drive at high speeds, drive around vehicles, etc). And because they have to perform emergency medical treatment, right?! Are we talking about different things - a mini hospital on wheels staffed by highly trained paramedics, and glorified taxis for the elderly/non-critical?

Some ambulances are just glorified taxis, others are staffed with EMTs who can do more.

If it weren't for the need to drive in a "non-standard" manner, you could likely save on costs by having an autonomous vehicle staffed by an EMT. The EMT can't also drive the vehicle, after all.

Re: Cities with Uber Have Lower Rates of Ambulance Usage

#115

Post by djsumdog »

pixelbill wrote: post #6

I'm curious, this article spins the whole "lower rates of ambulance usage" as a positive thing, but is there enough evidence to say that? From the article: _______ With demand for ambulances decreased by available Uber drivers, emergency personnel have been able reach critical patients faster while also applying necessary treatment on the way to the hospital, according to a new economic study from the University of K…

I agree. 7% is a really low number, and people shouldn't be afraid to call an ambulance just to save money. That's fucked up. Especially with comments talking about strokes and heart attacks. In most western countries, this isn't even an issue.

I honestly question of the numbers are even statically significant, but even if they are, this is seriously fucked up and not something Americans should be proud of at all!

Re: Cities with Uber Have Lower Rates of Ambulance Usage

#116

Post by djsumdog »

philliphaydon wrote: post #101
djsumdog wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How much is an ambulance in Australia? Last time I was there, I saw a protest against the Abbot government (yea it was that long ago) because he wanted to put in a co-pay (yes, Australians don't have co-pays). In the US, with insurance, they're typically like $300.

I don’t know if it’s the same for everyone, but about 8 years ago I got gastro and thought I was dying because I was in so much pain. I was a Kiwi living in Australia l, called myself an ambulance and I don’t have Medicare so figured I had to pay the bill. After being discharged I gave them my passport and the hospital bill was $0 while the ambulance bill was around $950 Aud. When I moved to singapore to live I got a…

So Aussies and Kiwis can live/work in the other country without visas (instant residence) but whoever drafted that agreement really fucked up. Aussies get instant ACC in NZ but Kiwis don't get Medicare in Australia. I remember there were discussions about it on Radio NZ a few years back.

There is a big private health care industry in Australia (for better or worse) that's not employer based (you see adverts on TV), so I'm guessing a lot of Kiwis just get private care in the AU.

But I'm wondering how much it costs an actual Australian resident/citizen with medicare. I know as a non-resident, a doctor cost around $70 ~ $80 (went once in Melbourne and once in Sydney) and I saw a real doctor. That's a far cry from America where you pay $200+ to see a Nurse Practitioner (yes, pretty advanced, but still not an MD).

Re: Cities with Uber Have Lower Rates of Ambulance Usage

#117

Post by kelnos »

TylerE wrote: post #16
adventured wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are a lot of private ambulance services in the US, they're anything but unregulated though as you'd expect with anything in the US medical field (one of the most regulated industries on earth). There's no theoretical reason why Uber couldn't get into the driving side of the business, with human drivers. Their future is in autonomous however, which will never be the ambulance business (it will never be autonomou…

Once automation gets good enough it'll probably be better at it then human drivers (imagine weaving through traffic, that sort of thing. It would also be able to do things like reroute in real time to avoid congestion. You'll still need warm bodies in the back for life support, but I see no reason that the human in the front seat can't be replaced by sufficiently advanced technology.

> reroute in real time to avoid congestion.

Hell, in this ideal future where most or all of the rest of traffic is also autonomous, you don't even need to avoid congestion -- you just "phone ahead" along the route to tell any cars in the way to, well, get out of the way. As long as you don't have standstill traffic (which might actually be something you can eliminate as a general rule with a fully-autonomous, networked fleet), you're fine.

Re: Cities with Uber Have Lower Rates of Ambulance Usage

#118

Post by peteretep »

FussyZeus wrote: post #63
throwaway0255 wrote: post #48

I injured myself and needed to go to the ER. The injury wasn't life threatening, but I definitely needed to go to the hospital immediately. I called an Uber. I don't have the time or expertise to do the months of legalese and calculus it would take me to understand my insurance policy, so I have no idea how much an ambulance ride would have cost me. $0? $400? $15000? None of those numbers would surprise me. As best I…

This is all coming from a hardcore capitalist, so know that going in: Health Insurance, as a concept, is disgusting. You "Insure" property. You "Insure" specifically against loss of that property, and the cost of insurance is determined (forgetting an awful lot of math, but the basics are) by: The value of the property in question, the amount of payout required to replace said property in the case of full loss, put u…

> you have an asset with incalculable worth

Actuaries, national health providers, governments -- generally they all have hard cash valuations for human life.

Re: Cities with Uber Have Lower Rates of Ambulance Usage

#119

Post by kelnos »

mysterypie wrote: post #49
will4274 wrote: post #43

A relevant personal anecdote - I hit my head earlier this year and gave myself a concussion, but did not realize it at the time. The next day, I began experiencing severe headaches, sensitivity to noise, sensitivity to light, etc. and decided to go to a hospital. I called an Uber. I'm not sure what I would have done without Uber. I guess I could call a cab, but I don't know that I would have wanted my ride to the hos…

> my ride to the hospital to be 30 minutes late, to refuse to turn the music down, and to tell me the credit card reader is broken As much as I'd like to stick it to taxis because of their decades of price gouging due to being granted a monopoly, I have not had many bad experiences riding a taxi. If I had to put a number on it, I'd say that less than 5% of my taxi rides were in any way unpleasant other than for the c…

In SF, pre-Uber, taxi dispatchers would universally quote "20 minutes" for expected arrival, when the reality was usually 40 minutes to never (where "never" was equally likely as a finite number). I called to complain about this (and other things) so often that one of the cab companies blacklisted me and stopped answering my calls.

Re: Cities with Uber Have Lower Rates of Ambulance Usage

#120

Post by kelnos »

djsumdog wrote: post #112
Malician wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If Uber says 5 minutes, it might be 7, or even possibly 15 if things go very, very wrong. Heck, if it's gonna be 15 you know this ahead of time because you can see the driver making wrong turns. If you call a taxi service, and they say "15 minutes," it could be 30, 45, or 60. Maybe they're mussing with the truth, maybe they're outright lying. You don't know, and without the map showing the driver, you have no way of…

A lot of modern taxi services have apps (often written by just a few big shops and contracted/branded out, but still). So you can start to get some of the same assurances from Taxis that you could get from Uber. Also even before Uber/apps, I never had a problem with calling a Taxi and it not showing up within a few min, and I've lived a lot of places.

I guess you never tried to get a taxi in SF, then. Pre-Uber, attempting to hail one could leave you standing in the street for several tens of minutes, and calling a dispatcher would get you the universal estimate of 20 minutes, which in reality would be 40 minutes or more, assuming they actually showed up, which was a tossup.
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