Sorta related side note, my experience has shown that dentists don't accept cash discounts for higher ticket procedures.
The Man Who Was Treated for $17,000 Less
11–20 of 121 posts
Re: The Man Who Was Treated for $17,000 Less
#12For a lot of stuff, the idea of pre-negotiating price between patient and provider sounds great. I'm not sure how emergency care can work well though without some third party to help set fair pricing. You get taken to a hospital out of your control, and they're allowed to decide what services to provide and as well as the price they're going to charge you. After the fact your only leverage to negotiate the bill down…
Here's a wild idea: emergency care should be handled by the state, and just accepted as the cost of living in a modern civilized society.
I agree with you, but that ripples outward. If I don't have to pay for emergency care, then why pay for insurance at all? I can just go hang out in the emergency room and they will take care of me. I realize a large sum of people do that right now, but that just reinforces how broken our current system is.
We have to fix healthcare in total before we can say thats a done deal, but it is the right direction.
Re: The Man Who Was Treated for $17,000 Less
#13There are some interesting tidbits in the article, but it falls apart in the last paragraph when we see the true motive of the article: "Sadly, we are heading in the exact opposite direction. ObamaCare expands the role of the third party and practically eliminates the role—and the say—of the patient in the delivery of health care. Will they ever learn?"
And then you see the writer's bumper at the end: "Dr. Singer practices general surgery in Phoenix, Ariz., and is an adjunct scholar at the Cato Institute."
So it's a Cato Institure article (Koch brothers) on the Wall Street Journal (News Corporation/Fox News/Murdoch) designed to end with an anti-'ObamaCare' message. How far the Wall Street Journal has fallen since Fox bought them in 2007.
Re: The Man Who Was Treated for $17,000 Less
#14There are some interesting tidbits in the article, but it falls apart in the last paragraph when we see the true motive of the article: "Sadly, we are heading in the exact opposite direction. ObamaCare expands the role of the third party and practically eliminates the role—and the say—of the patient in the delivery of health care. Will they ever learn?" And then you see the writer's bumper at the end: "Dr. Singer pra…
So what? Is a medical surgeon not qualified to have an opinion on ObamaCare? Or are you suggesting he is not permitted to be against ObamaCare?
Re: The Man Who Was Treated for $17,000 Less
#15In my experience having a high-deductible health insurance policy that that I purchase myself I think this bit of the article can't be understated.
"I explained that just because he had health insurance didn’t mean he had to use it in every situation. After all, when people have a minor fender-bender, they often settle it privately rather than file an insurance claim. Because of the nature of this man’s policy, he could do the same thing for his medical procedure. However, had I been bound by a preferred-provider contract or by Medicare, I wouldn’t have been able to enlighten him."
My wife and I have run into multiple cases in the last two years where our providers would have offered substantial discounts for paying cash, however because of the provider's contractual obligation (and state law, to boot) they are unable to accept cash payment and are required to bill our insurance at a higher rate than their cash discount. Since I have a high deductible I end up paying for the procedure out-of-pocket at a higher rate than if I could have just paid cash. It's maddening.
Re: The Man Who Was Treated for $17,000 Less
#16"Take the examples of Lasik eye surgery or cosmetic surgery. These services are not covered by insurance. Providers compete on the basis of quality, outcomes and price. And prices have continually dropped as quality and services have improved—unlike the rest of health care." Sadly, most people forget this. They think that healthcare is somehow immune from the laws of economics, that it is "special."
Many people will unabashedly say that they believe healthcare to be special. It's not uncommon to hear people say that they don't believe profit motive has any place in healthcare. I don't buy it. I don't see how healthcare is any more special than, say, food production (both are obviously vital to health), yet I think most people have come around to recognizing that profit motive is a spectacular way to organize the production and distribution of food.
Re: The Man Who Was Treated for $17,000 Less
#17There are some interesting tidbits in the article, but it falls apart in the last paragraph when we see the true motive of the article: "Sadly, we are heading in the exact opposite direction. ObamaCare expands the role of the third party and practically eliminates the role—and the say—of the patient in the delivery of health care. Will they ever learn?" And then you see the writer's bumper at the end: "Dr. Singer pra…
So you're fine with the ideas presented in the article, until you realize that the author is associated with groups that tend to share those ideas? I don't understand.
Re: The Man Who Was Treated for $17,000 Less
#18Earlier quoted context omitted.
Here's a wild idea: emergency care should be handled by the state, and just accepted as the cost of living in a modern civilized society.
I agree with you, but that ripples outward. If I don't have to pay for emergency care, then why pay for insurance at all? I can just go hang out in the emergency room and they will take care of me. I realize a large sum of people do that right now, but that just reinforces how broken our current system is. We have to fix healthcare in total before we can say thats a done deal, but it is the right direction.
Honestly, I think that the final answer really ought to be state-run hospitals that provide intensive and emergency care for free, and state-run doctor practices that serve as GPs and whatnot for communities. Private practices can exist, but they get to play in the market normally and price accordingly.
The problem is the metric crapton of Americans who will grind the system down as they fall prey to the beetus and obesity, and the number of wrongheaded bozos who think that letting the .gov handle this is somehow automagically a bad idea.
Re: The Man Who Was Treated for $17,000 Less
#19There are some interesting tidbits in the article, but it falls apart in the last paragraph when we see the true motive of the article: "Sadly, we are heading in the exact opposite direction. ObamaCare expands the role of the third party and practically eliminates the role—and the say—of the patient in the delivery of health care. Will they ever learn?" And then you see the writer's bumper at the end: "Dr. Singer pra…
So what? Is a medical surgeon not qualified to have an opinion on ObamaCare? Or are you suggesting he is not permitted to be against ObamaCare?
You would be rightly skeptical of an athlete’s endorsement of a brand of shoes they are being paid to sponsor, even though a disinterested athlete would be well qualified to comment, as a professional.
Similarly, in this case “paid for by the Koch brothers” is the most relevant part of his qualification here, not “surgeon”.
Re: The Man Who Was Treated for $17,000 Less
#20"Take the examples of Lasik eye surgery or cosmetic surgery. These services are not covered by insurance. Providers compete on the basis of quality, outcomes and price. And prices have continually dropped as quality and services have improved—unlike the rest of health care." Sadly, most people forget this. They think that healthcare is somehow immune from the laws of economics, that it is "special."
Many people will unabashedly say that they believe healthcare to be special. It's not uncommon to hear people say that they don't believe profit motive has any place in healthcare. I don't buy it. I don't see how healthcare is any more special than, say, food production (both are obviously vital to health), yet I think most people have come around to recognizing that profit motive is a spectacular way to organize the…
People think profit is a dirty word, especially if it is made "helping people." But why is it bad to make money helping people and not bad to make money not helping others, like people who make millions from selling fast food or selling iPhone apps?