How Bad is it in America? Breaking an arm among the thirty million without health care

victorhanson.com ^ | March 13, 2004 | Victor Davis Hanson

[billorites]

I broke my arm last week and went into the emergency room at our local hospital about 24 hours after a Sunday morning accident. My family doctor told me to go to the ER first to get an x-ray and then take it over to his office later that Monday afternoon.

[Dad was my hero]

Bump.

[dogbyte12]

The system genuinely is a mess though. My wife and I both have insurance. We however are not allowed to mix and match our programs for the cheapest price. For example, it is still just $15 for drugs under my plan, however, for her to be eligible to use it, she would have to quit her job. Then she would be covered under it.

This week, she was prescribed two medications. One of them, her insurance refused to cover. The other, they covered, yet by "covering", it was a $35 deductable. We ended up paying $78, when we should have been able to pay $30.

It drives me nuts to no end that we aren't able to opt out of a system if we are double insured. I have checked though, and it can't be done. I can not go to my employer and say, I am covered under my wife, how about you stop paying $6,000 a year to cover me, and instead, keep $3k, and give me the other $3k.

The HMO's refuse to do this, because a chunk of their profit margin comes from people who don't end up using their coverage.

[hope]

Ya know, it's really sad, cause alot of people who frequent doctor's end up in worse shape then they were originally...See if mom would like to get involved in a local church group for seniors...Or the local senior community group. Those people do so much together and it's nice they are with someone their age.

[annyokie]

Mom is all messed up on the Lord-------and not in a good way. She supposedly likes the fellowship, but spurns all the swains who are interested in her.

I wash my hands.

[hope]

I seem to forget they tend to have a mind of their own...they never really like our advice all the time, do they?...I gotta remember not to do that to my kids.

[annyokie]

LOL Good luck! I just chastised my 21 year old to pack his 17 YO girlfriend's butt back home to her shiftless parents.

He wasn't raised that way and he knows better.

[dennisw]

Stellar! But else can one expect from Victor Davis Hanson?

[dennisw]

Still, the cryptic answers I sort of got from one or two of the guarded staff could perhaps be summed up that a lot of people just liked going to doctors, whether out of loneliness or in need of conversation and attention.  

My thoughts too even before I got to this sentence

[hope]

OMG! I have one of those...17YO that is...She is starting to come back to reality now...No regular boys in her life to worry me yet. although she is very pretty, she just isn't really smart. But, she is hard working and hoping to be an entrepreneur some day..LOL!

[MarkL]

Another big problem is the co-pay system. I have good health insurance that costs me $12.00 a month. Catch is that there is a $3,000.00 deductible. I have no problem with this, I go to the doctor maybe twice a year and, not counting proscriptions, spend under $500.00 a year on everything. If I need it for major medical it is there.

I think I am the only person in my branch who chose this plan. The rest chose the kind where you pay $10.00 or $20.00 a visit and they go for a stubbed toe.

I never thought that I'd say this, but thank goodness for the passage of HIPPA, at least the "portability" portion of it. You see, I used to work for a company with no insurance benefits, and being the somewhat responsible sort, I decided to get my own insurance... This was back around 1995 or so... While I rarely used my insurance, not bothering to see the doctor for more than a year at a time, I did have 2 problems... I was diagnosed with Crohns Disease, and I needed emergency back surgury, due to an extruded disk (into my spinal canal). Well, while my insurance had always gone up substantially every year, whether I ever filed a claim or not, the last 3 years I had my insurance, it seemed as if the insurance company was trying to force me to drop my coverage by really jacking up the cost of my premiums. FWIW, I haven't had a single claim at all in the last two years (no Dr visits, or Rx) of coverage... But the cost went up 24% and 29% a year respectively... Luckily, the company I worked for was bought by a very large company, and due to HIPPA, they had to accept me into their insurance coverage... Which runs about $90 a month... Had I not gotten that coverage, my insurance premiums on my self insured policy would have run $495 a month... And that was with a $4000 deductible, the greatest they would allow.

At the rate things were going, I figured that I would be able to afford another 2 years of insurance at most... After that, I would have had to sell my house for just a few more years of coverage, or dropped it entirely.

Mark

[Capriole]

As ever, Hanson is right. I spend my days analyzing medical and billing records from hospitals all over the United States and determining what sort of care people receive. Many of the people whose records I examine (with their permission) don't have a social security number, if you know what I mean. Still, they come in and get a $125,000 quintuple bypass, are seen by numerous fine cardiologists, receive the most elaborate rehab, and don't pay a dime. If Medi-Cal won't shell out, no problem; the patient walks away from the bill. Nobody who wants health care in this country is denied it, and the quality is generally superb. (Of course, if people choose to live in an area where there is no nearby health care, that's their prerogative.) What's wrong with health care in this country is not that we don't offer it to enough people but that we are trying to fund the health needs of everyone in Central America, too. We can't afford it, and it has to stop. It has to.

[Dubya]

I'm sorry that it happned to you.

Immigrant care policy draws many undocumented immigrants

[techwench]

oh yes! '90 nissan pickup with 200K miles on it and no job or newer car in site. hope it doesn't break down!

[techwench]

reminds me of the old joke with a chiropractor standing in line behind an attorney while waiting for movie tickets. the chiropractor starts massaging the attorney's shoulders. the attorney snaps around and says "what the hell do you think you're doing?"

the chiro responds "i'm a chiropractor and i'm just keeping in practice while waiting"

the attorney quickly retorts "well i'm a lawyer and you don't see me screwing the guy ahead of me, do you?"

[Polybius]

Another big problem is the co-pay system. I have good health insurance that costs me $12.00 a month. Catch is that there is a $3,000.00 deductible......I think I am the only person in my branch who chose this plan. The rest chose the kind where you pay $10.00 or $20.00 a visit and they go for a stubbed toe.

You have made a responsible choice to use insurance as a safety net against an unexpected financial disaster rather than as an admission ticket to an all-you-can-consume medical smorgasbord.

The co-pay system is in place to avoid making medical care totally free and thereby make it cheaper for Moms and senior citizens to socialize at the Doctor's Wating Room that it would be to socialize at the local latte stand or bowling alley.

When I was an active duty Navy medical officer, "recreational medicine" by bored dependant wives (Dependant Wife, Navy Active Duty.....Military ID Code: DWNAD.......Pronounced "Dwah-Nads") was becoming such a problem that the Navy was seriously considering instituting a co-pay system of $5 per medical visit so that DWNAD's would consider taking their four kids to Chuck E. Cheese instead of the Navy Clinic on a boring rainy day.