If they are just having these discussions now instead of when this ponzi scheme was first floated to them, then they will die a deserved death.
Entrepreneurs see this upheaval as an opportunity to have somethings in place cutting every third party operator out of the doctor-patient relationship. I already have a team working on this right now.
Good luck.
I remember not having insurance after military life — not that many years ago. We saw the doctor, paid our $15.00, and the nurse (the doctor’s wife) was the one who checked us out. We had one hospitalization during that time. It was a two-day stay and was less than $1000.00.
A couple years later, we had a so-called Cadillac plan with BC/BS.
However, we continued paying out of pocket to see our FP because our family plan required a family deductible of $2500.00 before we qualified for the 80/20 — which we could never meet because we were all healthy.
But emergencies and hospitalizations were covered 100 percent, so we felt good about our coverage.
I really miss those days!
If I could have my way, it would be that your team take us back — adjusting for inflation, of course.
what obummercare may do, is force and accelerate what needed to happen- for patients to work directly with their doctors and surgeons to arranged reasonably priced self-pay care. Case in point: we recently arranged and self-paid for my husband’s umbilical hernia surgery- initial new patient surgeon office visit ($200), surgeon fee for actual surgery ($300), surgical center ($1350), anesthesia ($300), and 2 followup surgeon visits(free). The best quote we got for hospital was around $4500 self-pay cash up front and that didn’t include surgeon or anything else. Rates were significantly higher if you had insurance, and of course it’s false to assume insurance “pays” as you pay premiums and deductibles and co-pays.