61–70 of 154 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think I'd rather wait longer for elective surgery than gamble on ruining my children's chances at going to university because I might have to spend their tuition on medical bills.
Don't most countries with socialized healthcare also have free (or affordable) education?
We live in a world of marvels. Often we talk of the future and it's wonders waiting to be discovered, but the here and now has become equally astonishing. The breadth, depth and scale of human ingenuity and endeavour is jaw-dropping and here Simone and her story is another example. Maybe I'm being trite by looking for the good in the bad but pause for a moment and think of all that has been learned, how we have built…
The whole system is awe-inspiring. Have a medical emergency? We'll send a several-ton box on wheels speeding your way within minutes. If you're in a city, the traffic lights will turn red as the emergency vehicle approaches to make passing safer. Paramedics trained in evidence-based pre-hospital medicine will perform the interventions most likely to save you based on their field impression. And when you arrive at the…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
On the flip side people living in socialized healthcare Countries have other stresses. In the usa my insurance lets me go to 10 doctors for differing opinions. I can go straight to a specialist. When I need non urgent surgery it's scheduled with a few weeks instead of months.
I can do the same in Germany with public insurance.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
On the flip side people living in socialized healthcare Countries have other stresses. In the usa my insurance lets me go to 10 doctors for differing opinions. I can go straight to a specialist. When I need non urgent surgery it's scheduled with a few weeks instead of months.
> In the usa my insurance lets me go to 10 doctors for differing opinions. I can go straight to a specialist. When I need non urgent surgery it's scheduled with a few weeks instead of months. Only if you have good insurance. Insurance companies have been cracking down on this behavior. For example, there are certain specialists which are straight-up not covered unless you have an explicit referral. Likewise, networks…
1. Doc recommends a long list of blood tests for reasons she can’t seem to articulate. She’ll also recommend a testing lab. Oh, and see this specialist!
2. Now I have to figure out:
a) which tests do I actually need and which ones are just being recommended out of abundance of caution or because the doc needs to protect herself legally?
b) will my insurance cover the tests I’m going to do? If not (or even if so) how much will they cost me?
c) will my insurance work at this particular lab? The lab often won’t know.
d) do I really need to see this specialist or is my doc just tossing some juicy business to her med school buddy?
e) is the specialist in my insurance’s network?
f) how much is the specialist’s bill likely to be?
g) how much will my insurance pay?
3. Do all the things (or not)
4. Random bills for random amounts start landing in my mailbox over the next few months. They could be anywhere between $100 and $10,000, totally impossible to know ahead of time. I now have to pick up the phone and start negotiating with the doctors and my own insurance company, figuring out what I can pay now, what will have to wait, etc. Usually the insurance company will say something about a deductible and “you have to pay LOL.”
The stress is enough to give me an ulcer (which I’d need to visit yet another specialist for, is this one in-network or out?)
So this country doesn't make enough money to be able to keep some unlucky people alive without throwing them or their family into poverty? Or is it simply that nobody cares for anybody else as long as you are better off then them?
It always finds the form of "America is the richest country in the world, yet they can't [insert problem]."
This assumes that there is some objective resource need recognition system and misses that there is no overarching explicit capital allocation system to direct funds in such a way.
The cash balance of Apple corporation has no connection to whether a blogger can afford brain surgery or not.
So I'm not sure why this keeps coming up.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Because of the way insurance tends to work in America, care providers tend to throw shit at the wall to see what sticks. In other words the first bill is always an outrageous amount of charges that may or may not be valid. Additionally there's something called a negotiated rate that an insurer has with the care provider, usually the care provider's bill does not show this rate but rater some fiction that not even tho…
> added stress of the huge bills I really wish people would talk about these sorts of soft costs more often. I grew up in the UK, moved to the USA in my mid 20s. While growing up, my parents divorced and my mother had to take care of me and a sibling. All 3 of us had medical conditions that needed regular care/checkups. Not once did my mum ever spend hours on the phone chasing down bills or insurance rejections. We n…
It can get even worse and more subtle than that. I don't even get care in some situations that feel optional because I don't know what the true cost will be. I have money and insurance, but I'm instinctively uncomfortable about electing for services that I won't know the true cost of until weeks later after the care provider and insurance company have done their dance.
There's the deductible which I understand but that's not a blanket thing where everything is free after that. There's always fine print and a cloud of uncertainty about where the limits are for each category.
I'm starting to break this instinct, Blue Cross seems transparent enough when I call them and have a specific question. But that's because I'm getting older and taking health more seriously. I went through a long period when I was younger just ignoring symptoms when I could. Nothing bad happened to me but I've seen friends get diagnosed with cancer that might have been more treatable if found sooner. How many insured people don't get care that they should because they're confused or cynical about the system being set up to extract money from them?
So this country doesn't make enough money to be able to keep some unlucky people alive without throwing them or their family into poverty? Or is it simply that nobody cares for anybody else as long as you are better off then them?
I believe it is highly American to believe in self-sufficiency and to minimize the role of luck in success or failure. Whether we go back to the Protestant work ethic, the Puritan sensibility, gold rushes, unfettered capitalism, the Gilded Age, and our current second gilded age, to me it is clear that caring for others is a secondary concern for many Americans. Just look at the "makers/takers" model of our populace p…
A) Healthcare costs are too high, and it's due to malpractice/overregulation/other government influences. B) In the event that an individual can't afford healthcare, the community will pick up the tab -- and have the money to do it, since the government isn't taxing it away from them.
We live in a world of marvels. Often we talk of the future and it's wonders waiting to be discovered, but the here and now has become equally astonishing. The breadth, depth and scale of human ingenuity and endeavour is jaw-dropping and here Simone and her story is another example. Maybe I'm being trite by looking for the good in the bad but pause for a moment and think of all that has been learned, how we have built…
I recently switched from iPhone to Andriod.. I am utterly blown away by the voice to text feature. With 0 mistakes it is able to recognize and transcribe audio. I can write 500 words in a matter of a few minutes. I can just say switch on the flashlight and it comes on. Turn off the bluetooth and it gets turned off. I can even just say "call (insert name of restaurant)" and it directly calls them up. I am beyond blown…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Maybe the deductible part is a fixed amount and not a % of the total bill? (I have no knowledge of health care in the US - both countries I lived in have free health care)
The deductible is (in my experience) a fixed amount. I have to pay about $5000 out of pocket before everything becomes "free".
So glad to see Simone back on her feet. The sh y robot nation needs its queen! As for that bill -- I'm curious: is there any resource I can look up to see how much of that the average Medicare/Medicaid/private insurance plan pays? I ask because I just had two teeth repaired after a bike accident and it'll cost me ~$100 after insurance covers the other ~$500. By that ratio, she'd be looking at ~$38,000 bill.
Two years ago my wife (25 weeks pregnant with twins) was admitted to the hospital because of some concerning ultrasound findings for one of the twins they wanted to monitor closely. Two months later they were delivered by c-section, both healthy but very small (3 lb 14oz, and 1 lb 13oz). The bigger one spent ~3 weeks in the NICU and the smaller one ~7 weeks. All told it was ~18 weeks of hospitalization (the only majo…