Posted on 11/27/2007 6:50:27 AM PST by shrinkermd
Hundreds of hospice providers across the country are facing the catastrophic financial consequence of what would otherwise seem a positive development: their patients are living longer than expected.
Over the last eight years, the refusal of patients to die according to actuarial schedules has led the federal government to demand that hospices exceeding reimbursement limits repay hundreds of millions of dollars to Medicare.
The charges are assessed retrospectively, so in most cases the money has long since been spent on salaries, medicine and supplies. After absorbing huge assessments for several years, often by borrowing at high rates, a number of hospice providers are bracing for a new round that they fear may shut their doors.
One is Hometown Hospice, which has been providing care here since 2003 to some of the most destitute residents of Wilcox County, the poorest place in Alabama.
The locally owned, for-profit agency, which serves about 60 patients, mostly in their homes, had to repay the government $900,000, or 27 percent of its revenues, from its first two years of operation, said Tanya O. Walker-Butts, a co-owner. Its profits were wiped out in the time it took to open the demand letters, Ms. Walker-Butts said.
Hometown paid its first assessment with a bank loan. When the bank declined credit for the second year, the hospice structured a five-year payment plan with the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, the federal agency that administers the program, at 12.5 percent interest.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
mark
“I would never put anyone I loved in a hospice.”
It sounds as though you had a bad experience. That is unfortunate, as well as, in my experience the exception to the rule.
I have patient’s who die in hospice fairly often: I of course cannot recount their testimony, but almost universally, their families found he experienced to be a godsend when the alternative is considered.
agree
He was a very hard seller. He came back to me many times with this. Did he have my Mom’s best interest in mind? I don’t know. Like you said, he’s a doctor, and that’s his job..and that’s how he makes money. By the way, this is not what we were in the hospital for. If you take tests of an elderly person, you’re going to come up with many things that may, or may not be fixable. This is my point. Because the government pays, the decisions AND THE OPTIONS are much different. If we want a system where every option is on the table and the cost doesn’t matter, than let’s just do it and get it over with, and we’ll be ok with giving 70% of our taxes to health care. This is the decision we’re going to have to decide as a country. I don’t know the answer but I’m going to keep asking the questions, even if I’m shot down on this site.
Dehydration and starvation are absolutely euphoric methods of death...and highly dignified too!
...from what I’ve heard
:) I miss you. Hope all is well.
I think a lot of them just have a hard time accepting there’s only one way out of here, any form of comprehending that death is inevitable seems to scare them. I’ve seen death in the hospital with the beeping machinery and the crash carts and the harsh lighting, and I’ve seen death in the hospice with the quiet music and the comfortable seating (I know that sounds terribly superficial, but when you’ve done a couple months with a dieing relative you really learn to hate hospital chairs, and it was one of the first things I noticed in the hospice), while neither was what I’d call a pleasant experience if I have to do it again I’m voting for the quiet dignified path it’s a lot less scarring. The next few weeks with the funeral prep and the distribution of belongings are bad enough, might as well arrive there peacefully.
After years of hospitals and machines and all that goes with lung cancer, my brother’s final weeks were in a facility that looked like a warm home, with beds and couches we could sleep on so we could all be with him during his final moments...NO BEEPING MACHINES, no PA systems paging doctors...only flowers and sunlight and love..and enough drugs to make him comfortable as he danced to heaven. For the life of me, I can’t see how people here can say such cruel things about hospice.
I agree with you totally. BUT, we have already decided to have ‘healthcare’ since we are all paying for those who can’t. This is only for the little people anyway because those who have will certainly never be dying in a hospice they are much toooo good for that. So since the decision has been made and because if I have to pay for those who have no money—I want the most for the longest for myself. Doesn’t that sound just about right and fair? It seems everyone fails to recognize the working person is the one paying the bill and it is the working person that most think should be honorable and die early to save money. WHY SHOULD THEY?
At some point you stop fighting disease and start fighting God. The decision of where that point occurs has to be left to individuals and their families. It is a blessing that there are options for people who have reached that point.
I’m so sorry for your losses.
whoa!
Steady big guy!
I was stationed at Terri Shiavo’s hospice facility for a number of days protesting that horror of a legal and human tragedy. That Easter week was the best way my friend and i could give to another, by standing up for the voiceless.
My comment comes as a near quote of the murderers of that poor girl.
...so cool down lad!
p.s. sorry to hear of your gm’s sis.
May His peace and presencebe upon you constantly MamaB
"This person suffering from hereditary defects costs the people 60,000 Reichmarks during his lifetime. People, that is your money. Read 'New People', the monthly magazine of the race politics office of the NSDAP [National Socialist German Workers Party]"
In case anybody missed it, the NSDAP is the Nazi Party.
Not yet. They have to get assissted suicide firmly in place first. Then the right can turn into a duty.
I agree with the both of you 100%. Especially if you are put in a nursing home.
For once we agree.
Very kind of him.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.