How much does the Affordable Care Act addresses this? I know insurance can't be denied to people with pre-existing conditions and there can't be any life-time expense caps. But is there any measure to address the high cost of health care in US?
Diagnosis: Insufficient Outrage
21–30 of 98 posts
Re: Diagnosis: Insufficient Outrage
#22Seriously, just copy the EU on healthcare. You might need to pay extra taxes, and take an extra insurance against hospitals fees. But it's all very affordable.
If it wasn't for A) getting the same answer for most of my ills: inflammations :p B) The doctor being very busy. C) Basic respect to not stress our medical system. One would go for the tiniest medical complain.
Re: Diagnosis: Insufficient Outrage
#23Seriously, just copy the EU on healthcare. You might need to pay extra taxes, and take an extra insurance against hospitals fees. But it's all very affordable. If it wasn't for A) getting the same answer for most of my ills: inflammations :p B) The doctor being very busy. C) Basic respect to not stress our medical system. One would go for the tiniest medical complain.
Doctors and medical facilities would need to make a lot less money. That is the source of most of the cost difference. The vehicle of payment is maybe a secondary cause. It might be good to change it, but if it's not directly responsible for the majority of the difference in what doctors are getting paid, it's not going to fix the problem.
Re: Diagnosis: Insufficient Outrage
#24How much does the Affordable Care Act addresses this? I know insurance can't be denied to people with pre-existing conditions and there can't be any life-time expense caps. But is there any measure to address the high cost of health care in US?
Insurance providers don't pay these sky high rates so it effectively reduces the out of pocket expenses of patients, significantly.
Re: Diagnosis: Insufficient Outrage
#25I don't get how a cardiac stress test can cost 2000USD. You put someone on a home trainer, let them pedal for 20 minutes, and look at their EKG. It's usually performed by a nurse, and the doctor spends 30 seconds looking at the EKG (the analysis of the EKG is even partially automated). If there was actual competition on the market, I'm sure a health service provider would find a way to perform the test for 75USD.
The hospitals just charge that because they can. What most people don't know is that you can often negotiate them down.
Re: Diagnosis: Insufficient Outrage
#26Prescription: Free Market Competition
Why don't you elaborate instead of just yelling "free market!" and waving your hands? How might we encourage competition effectively?
Re: Diagnosis: Insufficient Outrage
#27I don't get how a cardiac stress test can cost 2000USD. You put someone on a home trainer, let them pedal for 20 minutes, and look at their EKG. It's usually performed by a nurse, and the doctor spends 30 seconds looking at the EKG (the analysis of the EKG is even partially automated). If there was actual competition on the market, I'm sure a health service provider would find a way to perform the test for 75USD.
People who have stress tests administered often have underlying cardiac or pulmonary disorders that can be aggravated. A not insignificant subset of people doing stress tests can enter into hypotensive shock or even cardiac arrest, the facility has to be prepared to deal with adverse effects as those reactions can be fatal.
Yes - it pays to have a big defib (not one of the 'press button now' mall variety), an experienced and qualified staff member or 5 with high level CPR training, and some good cardiac event type drugs, and a load of proper monitoring gear (heart rate, BP, etc). While these things aren't especially cheap, they would pay off fairly quickly at a decent clinic, and I was involved in the purchase of most this stuff for sub $10k US recently for a clinic (but got a mall style defib as our needs are different). Staff would be the greatest cost. That said, at 2k per test, most expenses for the year would be paid of in the first week or 3 at a busy clinic surely?
Re: Diagnosis: Insufficient Outrage
#28This rings so true. When I had graduated college I was in a 3 week lull between graduation and a job around January when I was struck with a kidney stone. No health insurance. I took a trip to the ER around 10pm one evening in agonizing pain and was treated like a drug addict. I wasn't even triaged for over 2 hours (peak flu season) and everyone acted like I was just trying to score pain meds. Finally, after 3.5 hour…
I broke my knee this spring but didn't go to a hospital on my families request because the last time I broke a bone I reset it myself and the hospital still charged $8k.
I still have blood in the joint, but I can't get it drained because no doctor will stick a needle in without an x-ray, but those are expensive. So I'm waiting till I move out and get a full time position in a bigger city to get health care to have it fixed.
Probably going to have arthritis at 40....
Re: Diagnosis: Insufficient Outrage
#29Prescription: Free Market Competition
That or socialised healthcare...
Re: Diagnosis: Insufficient Outrage
#30Seriously, just copy the EU on healthcare. You might need to pay extra taxes, and take an extra insurance against hospitals fees. But it's all very affordable. If it wasn't for A) getting the same answer for most of my ills: inflammations :p B) The doctor being very busy. C) Basic respect to not stress our medical system. One would go for the tiniest medical complain.
It isn't a "duh" problem in the US. Especially in the presence of less educated or rural communities, who buy media propaganda that socialized medicine kills grannies, and amongst retirees who are already getting thousand dollar checks each month from the government but don't want anyone else getting any benefits, because the uninsured are "jobless hippies".
That, and there is a huge insurance lobby ripe with exploiting the corruption of congress and the 2 party oligopoly that keep pressure on maintaining insurer profits.
We pay significantly more by having every uninsured person come in with emergency needs rather than seeking preventative care, but the average American doesn't care, because they "deserve it" for not having a job that gives insurance. The ideology is completely backwards, but intentional on the parts of those who profit off it.