111–120 of 148 posts
I have heard that person care providers that incentivize them to keep the medical costs per patient low, especially for HMOs. If there are doctors who are reluctant to have patients with disabilities, could metrics KPIs be in play here?
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A large portion of patients ( customers seems like a dirty word in this context...) can't even afford insurance!
Of course, because the root problem in the US is most people cannot afford the healthcare that they expect to receive. Hence all the political maneuvering to redistribute wealth, and the corresponding efforts to avoid having one’s (present or future) wealth redistributed.
Anybody with a chronic condition needs to go see a doctor at least once a year in order to get the same prescriptions they've been on for decades. There are dozens, if not hundreds of conditions that could be handled by a pharmacy.
I need an asthma inhaler every so often. I have to call a medical doctor in order to receive a prescription for an asthma inhaler. They're non-narcotic, I will always have asthma. But I need to bother a doctor for a medication that should be over the counter. It's silly.
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You can just keep the pills. If you're really that strong about avoiding addiction why do you feel the need to throw them away?
Most medicine has expiration dates. If he needs it only every 3-5 years, it's unlikely the pills will still be usable.
Yes it will. The pills don't actually expire. They will work unchanged for decades.
See: https://www.health.harvard.edu/staying-healthy/drug-expirati...
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Spot on. It becomes more clear when you ask who pays medical professionals salaries? Insurance companies do. Insurance companies are medical professionals’ bosses. The customer receiving treatment has no influence on the standard of care.
This is partly true. In no small part because they tend to control the bulk (or all) of our patient supply. In part because people have gotten the idea that insurance equals care, and vice versa - so people tend not to think about high-impact moments where it pays to go cash. For instance, I specialize in neuromodulation for highly-treatment-resistance psychiatry. I'm very good at what I do; my mentor is (IMO) better…
Could the ADA itself be the cause of at least some of this hesitation by some doctors to want to deal with disabled patients? With a disabled patient, there's a larger chance that something about your medical practice (the parking lot, the hallway, the stairs and ramps, the chairs in the waiting room, the equipment in your office, etc) aren't going to satisfy somebody and you're faced with a dumb legal headache even…
Yes, since ADA mandates that accommodations must be provided at no cost to the patient (an unfunded mandate). Here is a tidbit from the article: Participants described both financial and time-related challenges of accommodating communication needs. One non-rural-practicing primary care physician stated: “I took it upon myself to actually hire an outside service to do [sign language interpretation]. They billed the of…
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I have a lot of experience with doctors. I've found regardless of what you look like unless you're going to a concierge clinic you wont even get the time of day from most of them. It seems to be a volume business, and thus they just go through the motions. Much like tech with engineers, the good doctors seem to leave as soon as you find them.
Well, that's an anecdote, but numerous studies indicate that black people, indigenous people, women, people in poverty, transgender people, are systematically mistreated by health care systems in north america. I know HN loves to pretend that racism only affects white people, but it just ain't so.
Do you normally just make things up?
N=1, but I can confirm the experience of being disabled and getting medical care is mutually frustrating. Taylorism and one-size-fits-all fails hard. Appointment times are standardized, despite patients not being standard. I know I'm going to take extra time. I have multiple chronic conditions, getting treatment is a mess. But I can't arbitrarily ask for more time during booking; it's all automated now. Worse, I need…
https://www.dpcare.org/ is a good place to start, but I guarantee there's direct primary in your city - just google for it.
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My EOBs have always stated what the healthcare provider is owed per the insurance price. It shows what was billed (the fantasy number), then the insurance price (or the discount), and patient responsibility (dependent upon an individual’s deductible/copay/oop max). Is that not true?
You’re more literate than most patients. You’re right, it should list all of the above. I think your post reads (and per other poster, I’m not alone) that you had a $1300 normal outpatient visit, so I read that as you misreading your bill.
Sorry for the confusion. I stated the EOB to hopefully clarify that. Assuming that they got even 90% of that the doctor would be pushing $200+/hr. just to take my temperature.
N=1, but I can confirm the experience of being disabled and getting medical care is mutually frustrating. Taylorism and one-size-fits-all fails hard. Appointment times are standardized, despite patients not being standard. I know I'm going to take extra time. I have multiple chronic conditions, getting treatment is a mess. But I can't arbitrarily ask for more time during booking; it's all automated now. Worse, I need…
Spot on. It becomes more clear when you ask who pays medical professionals salaries? Insurance companies do. Insurance companies are medical professionals’ bosses. The customer receiving treatment has no influence on the standard of care.
I realized then that I was part of the problem, not on a personal level, but part of everyone's high medical bills ended up in my pocket as a developer at this random healthcare company awkwardly filling our niche.
15% of US workers are in the healthcare industry, and they're not all doctors and nurses. All those people have to be paid, and all of them have to be paid by that ridiculously high medical bill you just received. Sadly, making healthcare cheaper will involve pushing a lot of these people out of the industry, and that won't be politically popular. The insurance companies are going to have to become smaller and lose some profits before things get better.