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Cancer Complications: Confusing Bills, Maddening Errors And Endless Phone Calls

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Re: Cancer Complications: Confusing Bills, Maddening Errors And Endless Phone Calls

#271

Post by JamesBarney »

rndgermandude wrote: post #76
JamesBarney wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm all for universal coverage too. But reducing the profits of pharmaceutical companies well reduce the money they have for r&d dramatically. This will slow down the speed of pharmaceutical development. So I think it needs to be paired with reforms to the FDA to reduce the go to market costs for drugs.

What kind of evidence do you have for this claim?

Evidence that if the profits of new drug drops significantly that the money spent on R&D on those new drugs will also drop?

Imagine the government decides to tax 80% of all revenue from all technology companies forever. Do you think funding for startups would increase, stay the same, or drop?

The obvious answer is drop, but what type of evidence would you expect to support this statement. A study of people taxing technology companies @ 80%? Or are you arguing with the premise that investment rates are correlated with profitability?

Re: Cancer Complications: Confusing Bills, Maddening Errors And Endless Phone Calls

#272

Post by DanBC »

komali2 wrote: post #74
vamos_davai wrote: post #4

It's such an absurd expense that I wonder if I get diagnosed with cancer, I would just deny treatment, accept death, and hand my assets to loved ones. Not sure if anyone else thinks the same way.

I think your family would spend that money and more to get more time with you.

How much time? Two weeks? This is how long some of these advanced, very expensive, cancer meds give you. https://www.bmj.com/content/357/bmj.j2097

Re: Cancer Complications: Confusing Bills, Maddening Errors And Endless Phone Calls

#273

Post by ThrustVectoring »

duxup wrote: post #64

>Cancer Complications: Confusing Bills, Maddening Errors And Endless Phone Calls Hell that's just insurance in America... if you just use it. I've been dealing with a bill where the insurance company decided that my kid's pediatrician was out of network all of a sudden. All the other visits to the same pediatrician have been covered, but they can't seem to fix this one bill.... There's no incentive for the company to…

File a regulatory complaint. Boom, now they have incentive to fix things.

Re: Cancer Complications: Confusing Bills, Maddening Errors And Endless Phone Calls

#274

Post by rootusrootus »

metalliqaz wrote: post #102
chaosbutters wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

doesn't matter who is president in 2020, if the senate isn't blue. And right now, it doesn't look like the senate will even hit 50/50.

The political system in the US biases area over population. The Senate will remain conservative as long as rural states remain conservative, and that will never change.

I'm not sure I'd bet on that. Cities are almost universally liberal, and even rural states start to turn blue as they get their own big cities.

Re: Cancer Complications: Confusing Bills, Maddening Errors And Endless Phone Calls

#275

Post by peteradio »

untog wrote: post #32
vamos_davai wrote: post #4

It's such an absurd expense that I wonder if I get diagnosed with cancer, I would just deny treatment, accept death, and hand my assets to loved ones. Not sure if anyone else thinks the same way.

I don't think anyone can think about it realistically until they are in that situation. How much is another year of your life worth to you? And to your loved ones for that matter? (assuming we're talking terminal cancer here, which it might not be) I have family that suffered from cancer and spent a good lot of money prolonging their life by about eighteen months. They were not pleasant months, but I don't think for…

Take that lump sum or in another way of looking at it have that lump sum taken from them. Depending on the family situation this could cause knock on effect leading to financial burdens that who knows, could lead to suicide? Is that worth 18 months of a doomed persons life?

Re: Cancer Complications: Confusing Bills, Maddening Errors And Endless Phone Calls

#276

Post by graedus »

sbov wrote: post #203
tmaly wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We still cannot get a price list of medical procedures in the US thanks to the antitrust exemption provided in McCarran-Ferguson Antitrust Act of 1945. I think repealing this would be a good start. All other industries are required to provide price lists. My friend went to the ER recently for a sprained thumb. They wrapped it in some bandage and he got a bill for $14,000. His insurance is covering 80% but he is still…

Don't go to the ER for a sprained thumb. Unless its an actual emergency, go to urgent care. I live in a pretty expensive area of California and they still only charge $95 per person they see. And our insurance covers it completely. And rightly so, they would much prefer a $95 bill to a $14,000 one. With kids we go a couple times per year. They definitely have saved us a lot of money and time.

Urgent care might be a good option where it's available. Even here though, I've been told I just need to pay my copay, which I did up front, then been billed a couple months later for some additional amount. I was lucky that the amount wasn't high so I just paid it rather than dig in, but it's very unclear how or why I was billed extra. This happens all the time.

Re: Cancer Complications: Confusing Bills, Maddening Errors And Endless Phone Calls

#277

Post by rootusrootus »

vamos_davai wrote: post #4

It's such an absurd expense that I wonder if I get diagnosed with cancer, I would just deny treatment, accept death, and hand my assets to loved ones. Not sure if anyone else thinks the same way.

My doctor and I had a conversation about this and that was his position, though not for reasons of expense. He says it's a fairly popular position amongst his peers, as well. Those who get to see first-hand what treatment looks like don't want to go through it themselves.

Re: Cancer Complications: Confusing Bills, Maddening Errors And Endless Phone Calls

#278

Post by cletus »

coredog64 wrote: post #241
cletus wrote: post #34

In Australia the Leftist government of Gough Whitlam introduced health-coverage-for-all in 1975 with a scheme called Medibank. In 1984 after a couple of governments, Bob Hawke's Leftist government created the Medicare scheme (Medibank became a government provider of private health insurance), which exists to this day. The most interesting stat I ever heard about Medicare was this: prior to Medicare the number one cau…

A fair chunk of what we in the US would consider “medical bankruptcy” is not the bills, but a consequence of chronic illness. If I’m living paycheck to paycheck, any disruption is going to hurt. That could be unpaid leave, but it could also be disability insurance that doesn’t replace 100% of your income. Regardless of how health insurance is paid for, those are going to happen.

Let me play devil's advocate.

What if living paycheck-to-paycheck is a consequence of having no health coverage?

Think about it. If you're on a low income that largely matches your outgoings, bills of thousands of dollars will wipe you out regardless of whether or not you save. So why save? You may just reduce any benefits you get from the state or Federal government (medical or otherwise) and those will be wiped out anyway. So you may as well spend now.

Consider, the Earned Income Tax Credit is one of the few times lower income households can make large purchases (and there's evidence of this in TV purchases and elsewhere).

Re: Cancer Complications: Confusing Bills, Maddening Errors And Endless Phone Calls

#279

Post by tzs »

chimeracoder wrote: post #268
donaldknuth123 wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1. The data you posted is 20 years old. 2. The data is talking about 5 year survival rates and not actual survival. The US Healthcare system is great at keeping people alive who should have stopped treatment long ago. 3. The US is behind on every other major health indicator, Infant Mortality, Life Expectancy, Cardiovascular Disease, Obesity etc. Cancer isn't the only expensive illness in the US. This thread is overr…

> 1. The data you posted is 20 years old. It's from a study published 10 years ago. The study was repeated more recently and republished less than a year ago, reaffirming the original results. > 2. The data is talking about 5 year survival rates and not actual survival. The US Healthcare system is great at keeping people alive who should have stopped treatment long ago. There is no such thing as "actual survival". 5-…

Aren't those 5 year survival rates from time of diagnosis?

If so, it is possible for two countries that have the same survival rate measured from actual onset of the cancer to have a different 5 year survival rate.

Re: Cancer Complications: Confusing Bills, Maddening Errors And Endless Phone Calls

#280

Post by Cd00d »

ams6110 wrote: post #255
rtkwe wrote: post #248

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As other have said urgent care isn't everywhere and closes so it's not entirely by choice that people wind up in the emergency room for non emergency things. Beyond that it's hard to know sometimes what's emergency and what isn't until you have a doctor look at what's happening.

OK but a sprained thumb is not something that can't wait until morning. Take a couple of Advil and put some ice on it.

That assumes the patient _knows_ it's only a sprain.
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