Women and children hurt worst.
Posted on 07/22/2008 12:42:10 PM PDT by newbie2008
On Friday I reported that the U.S. scored poorly on the Commonwealth Fund’s National Scorecard. Those in favor of universal health care are probably rejoicing. “The U.S. system is dysfunctional beyond repair and we need universal health care!”
Yesterday, the Economist reported on an article in The Lancet Oncology journal which found that the U.S. has the best five year survival probabilities for breast and prostate cancer. Score one for those against universal health care. “The American free market is always the best!”
How can this be? How can we reconcile these two results?
The Lancet Oncology article controls also for other covariates which are related to survival probabilities, but do not relate to the quality of health care. For instance, if Americans get cancer later in life than people from other countries this is taken into account since people who are older are more likely to die of almost all causes, including cancer. Further, if traffic mortalities or the homicide rate are higher in the U.S. than in other countries, this will likely decrease the probability a cancer patient survival for 5 years, but is unrelated to the quality of medical care. If Americans are more likely to be obese, this also will decrease their survival probabilities, but should not be an indictment against the health care system. For these reasons, the 5 year cancer survival probabilities are adjusted to take into account the age and death rates in the general population. After these effects are taken into account, the U.S. scores very well in terms of cancer survival.
Of course cancer survival is only one of a myriad of ways of measuring the quality of the American health care system. Further, the U.S. spends the most money on healthcare (in total and per capita) compared to any other country. While the U.S. may (or may not) be the best, it is certainly the most expensive.
For now...but if Obama gets elected....
““The U.S. system is dysfunctional beyond repair and we need universal health care!””
Well the administration of our health care system is quite convoluted...but our actual care is best in the world.
Socialized medicine kills cancer patients.
Must be because our health care system is so much worse than say, Cuba, Canada or England.
I’m a 2 year 4 month lung cancer survivor. Knock on wood. And I thank God for our health care system.
Well, God and The Ohio State University Cancer Hospital.
“Death rates to rise in Massachusetts.”
Very unlikely. Massachusetts probably has the best healthcare delivery system in the country. You can go through the specialties one-by-one, and it’s rare for Mass not to have 2 hospitals in the top 10 in the country.
Hmmm, seems they may have had a little problem with the quality of Cuba’s data.
*cough, cough* Surely not *cough, cough*
The five year survival rate means very little. The USA has the very best diagnostic technology which enables hospitals to treat them longer before they die. The mortality rate from breast cancer is almost a flat line from 1930. The net benefit from breast cancer treatment approaches zero.
There, fixed it for you.
Part of the reason for the US’s poor rankings in overall healthcare system stems from two factors:
1) the amount of hours we work relative to other nations (and hence stress we experience over a lifetime)
2) our nation’s obesity rate.
Both of these variables lead to myocardial infarctions, strokes, and diabetes. And diabetes leads to all sorts of complications, including MIs and strokes.
Our black population is especially prone to diabetes and strokes. Really, our large minority populations skew the statistics in these stories. Hispanics are very, very, very prone to diabetes. And as for our uninsured, over 40% of them are illegal aliens.
We have a lot of problems, but our healthcare deliverty system is not nearly as bad as these “surveys” let on.
As an aside, when they say on Canada has a smaller percentage of patients with labs on their f/u with their physician, I’d also like to see the average length of time between these appointments.
Since the subject is cancer survival, here’s a little pick me up for fans of Patrick Swayze.
Swayze:”I’m A Miracle, Dude”
http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/showbiz/bizarre/article1449762.ece
must be all us americans going to canada and france for their healthcare and coming back cured!
I always thought the death rate was 100%. How can it rise above that?
In a decentralized system like ours, each patient is a profit center. Provide good service you get more patients into your hospital relative to your competitors.
In a universal system, each patient is just a cost center. No one’s revenues are increased by successful treatment. In a perverse way, your costs are lowered by death. What thinking person would think the benefits of such a system outweighs its costs?
That’s so wonderful to hear. God bless you and your continued good health.
Nope. Not 100%.
That doesn't mean that our health care isn't the best in the world. It means that those who have a lot of money, and are able to afford expensive procedures that might not have a great success rate have that option here in the United States.
We don't have socialized health care where the government is doing cost/benefit analysis with our lives. We get to do out own cost/benefit analysis if we have the money to afford the procedures, or at least health insurance that covers such procedures.
Our health care system doesn't provide equal health benefits to everyone in the country. However, new procedures, medicines, and equipment would never become available to most, if it was not first made available to those who are able to pay for it.
We pay on average higher health care costs, because we are willing to pay for new medical advances before they become commonly used, and their development costs have been mostly paid off.
The medical industry often recoups it's investment mainly in the US market, and then the rest of the world benefits as the costs decrease once much of the initial development costs have been paid off.
Socialized medicine won't suddenly make it cheaper to bring new medical advances to market, most likely it will do the opposite.
If the US goes to socialized medicine, advances will slow. We won't see as great of savings as we expect, and the costs will go up for others that take advantage of the fact that we are currently basically subsidizing the health care costs of everyone else.
If everyone gets the same level of treatment, and they are saying it will save money, doesn't that make it pretty obvious that some are obviously going to be getting worse treatment? It means that people are not only going to have even more of the money they have earned taken away to help others who have not earned it, but that they will be at greater risk of suffering serious harm or premature death as a result.
Ahhhhh. You are correct.
I was thinking of the MORTALITY rate:
# People who are born, Divided by # People who die.
Over a long period of time it aproaches 1.0.
Something for BO to CHANGE.
Thank You! And God Bless You!
Sorry.
# People who die, divided by #people who are born...
I’m having brain troubles today...
bump
Must be the enormous success of Chemo and radiation... >Grandfather....died of Melanoma, chemo & radiation. >Wife’s friend...died breast cancer, chemo & radiation. >Stepmom...died breast cancer, chemo & radiation. >2nd stepmom...died breast cancer, chemo & radiation. >personal friend...died esophageal cancer, chemo & radiation. >personal friend...stage 4 testicular cancer, chemo & radiation, given 8 months to live. >Church acquaintance, died blood cancer, Chemo. I’ve known various other co-workers and such that have gotten cancers of one form or another and have all died even after being treated with chemo, radiation or combination of the two, sometimes after surgeries. Hell, if that don’t kill’ya, the ded-gum cost of it all will. Both my friends (one passed, the other struggling) shared with me the enormous cost associated with the treatment of their cancers despite insurance. It is staggering. $14,000. for one chemo drip. $14K ???? Their share was much lower, however there monthly out of pocket is close to $4800. (each month). We certainly have the best health care in the world....if one can afford it.
The Commonwealth Fund has an agenda. I wonder what the founders of Standard Oil Company would think about how their money is being used to further socialism. It is ironic that the original Big Oil is where the Commonwealth Fund got its funding so many years ago.
jeez, do you and your friends live ON high tension power lines?!
My point was that I've known very few people who were treated with chemo or radiation that did any better than if they just let the cancer take it's course.
I'm prayin for two fella’s now, one is my friend I mentioned and the other a co-worker.
My friend's testicular cancer spread to his kidney, spine and possibly lung.
The co-worker seems to be doin ok for now. Brain tumor. He's being treated with chemo and radiation.....we will see.
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