Posted on 08/23/2014 1:34:04 PM PDT by Kid Shelleen
Dr. Sandeep Jauhar is mad as hell. American health care is in upheaval. On one side, overhead and malpractice insurance costs keep increasing, while salaries stagnate. On the other, patients believe that expensive drugs are better, more people are on government-run insurance that pays less, while private insurance fights every claim. Now doctors spend most of their time trying to game the system, requiring endless paperwork, protracted bureaucratic battles and “treadmill medicine,” seeing as many patients as possible in as little time. This problem will only intensify as millions join the ranks of the insured under the Affordable Care Act.
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
>>Fewer people will call an ambulance for a sore throat if they know they have to pay the first x thousand dollars out of pocket - they will go to the urgent care for the 25 dollar throat culture instead.<<
I have been curing my sore throats for 55 years with a eye dropper of hydrogen peroxide in my ears. Four hours later maximum - if it is not completely gone, then I would consider a throat culture. Guess how many throat cultures I have had in 45 years? You’re right, not a single one.
Socialized Medicine
The customer service of the Post Office.
The effiency of the DMV
And
The compassion of the IRS...
Either you’re not thinking clearly, or you’re lying. These two comments...
“It was doctors who sunk medicare. They should have seen it as a flawed system and not grown dependent on it”
“doctors had better figure out that government and insurance pays them and if they don’t like it they can do something else”
...are contradictory. The first says doctors shouldn’t have worked with medicare and the second says doctors should accept that government pays them.
And to say that “government and insurance pays them” is even more incoherent—it shows you favor the merging of private and public insurance systems.
She’s a hospitalist. All her patients are admitted to a hospital.
How many do you think pay cash out of pocket?
The Government doesn’t do anything well.......much less an entity that requires compassion to administer. The Government will never have emotion, that caring principle that is so necessary when caring for an ill person. The Socialists are trying to eliminate emotion from every walk of life. Sexual freedom dictates that the people involved not have an emotional attachment. That is what Nationalized Health Care does, too. No relationship between the doctor and patient. Treat ‘em and street ‘em. This country will rue the day when they allowed the Government to administer health care.
Yeah me too. I can work in the ER for free.
Oh wait, 30% of the patients ALREADY get seen for free.
Actually, I would LOVE to go up to that patient having chest pain, negotiate a price, and then say “will that be cash or charge?”.
I’d probably better have the paddles charged and ready to go at that point....
“The Impact of Health Care Fraud on the United States ...”
People might want to get educated on this subject if they want to opine. This is a good article.
Or just google the subject like I just did
No idea what you are saying.
Just for the record, and not directed at you, you might want to read up on the subject. It’s a quick google search. Fraud and medicare.
The medical care system in this country has nothing to do with healing.
Since medicare came in and insurance, third party payer, people have generally relinquished health to these systems which pay them to abuse their bodies and then go in to what has now become largely a pharmaceutical sales system.
Poor diet, lack of exercise and drug and alcohol abuse have become acceptable and our insurance and government third party payer have funded it.
Obesity and associated diabetes, heart disease, cancer have become normal, and very expensive.
If you read about what you think you are sounding smart on, you will find that as of 1997 medical providers accounted for 72% of the fraudulent claims to medicare.
Medicare has now had to monitor doctors. And doctors don’t like it.
Medicare was a bad deal, and it still is. For many reasons. BUt beyond that, fraud makes it worse. Any reasonable person would agree with that.
doctors can get paid any way they want to as far as I’m concerned, but they cannot whine about medicare nor insurance.
Among the things people who want to opine should read, is how costs have skyrocketed since medicare came in, and how people can no longer pay out of pocket.
It is also estimated, as of 1997, that individuals pay $1400 per year each to defray the costs of fraud to medicare, which we will remember, from the same report I cited in the previous post, is attributed to doctors by 72%.
so they can just quit whining.
None. Many or most never pay, medicare does. That means me and you.
So she can quit whining. She’s getting paid.
“The Government doesn’t do anything well”
The Lobby System Master root of all evil, is doing well in it’s attempt to brainwash and attempt to takeover the temple of the Holy Ghost.
Wheat and the tares. The Christ, or the anti-christ. The Harvest, is the end of the age.
We will quit whining. We are getting out.
Enjoy.
“Could it be that you have an axe to grind against the medical community? If so, maybe you could get your medical treatment in Canada.........”
You indicated I was vague with my complaint. Let me be specific.
I have been extremely ill for two years with several conditions requiring surgery, hospitalization and drug treatment. I’ve experienced both excellent care and extremely poor care. As with customer service from businesses I’ve found medical care varies by individual provider (the attitude, knowledge and skills of the individual provider) as well as the quality of management of the clinic or hospital providing the service. It is also my perception many of the ills in the medical system are caused by the heavy had of government and insurance companies behind the scenes determining how care will be administered. When a bureaucrat or insurance administrator in an office far away makes blanket decisions such as what care will and will not be provided under a set of circumstances, the ability of doctors and nurses to assess a particular, and tailor care to what may be a uniquely individual situation, is restricted, often to the detriment of the patient. When office visits for even complex cases are restricted by insurance companies to 15 minutes, including the time the doctor has to review the medical history walking into the appointment and to write up her notes after seeing the patient, the time actually working with the patient may not be sufficient and may result in a bad diagnosis and treatment.
In past two years I’ve gone to the ER in excruciating pain, was diagnosed with gall stones and told I needed to have an organ (gall bladder) removed. I questioned the diagnosis and asked if there was a test that could be performed to determine if the gall bladder needed to be removed. I was told my insurance company would not pay for the specific test that would prove conclusively if the organ required removal but would pay for the surgery which 95% of the people with my specific complaint require. I agreed to pay the cost of the test out of my own pocket. I was told the test indicated the surgery was needed (later I found out the test results were inconclusive). I had the surgery and two months later was back in the ER in excruciating pain. This time the gastroenterologist wanted to do another surgical procedure on the bile duct. The recommended procedure had 10% risk of death or permanent impairment of the gastrointestinal system. I left the hospital, used my personal contacts to get an appointment in three days with a specialist in the field at a major medical center (the doctor’s calendar was fully booked for 3 months, he saw me over lunch as a favor to a friend). After one hour of thoroughly reviewing my complete medical records including labs and surgical reports, he concluded I had been misdiagnosed and the recommended second surgery was not needed. After a few more tests to verify his conclusions it turned out I had pancreatitis which had been misdiagnosed as gall stones. It appears the surgery was unnecessary. Per the new physician the post operative pathological report from the gall bladder surgery, nor the test I paid for out of pocket, did not support removal of the organ.
I had another situation where an endocrinologist proscribed a drug to treat a hormonal condition. When the urologist I was seeing for another problem discovered I was taking the drug he asked me to stop taking it because it could cause cancer given my second condition and family medical history. The first doctor had not fully reviewed my medical records (which were in the electronic system) or family history before prescribing the drug which can trigger prostate cancer in men whose families have a history of the cancer.
For a neurological issue I was prescribed a nationally advertised drug by a neurologist. Within days of starting to take it I developed many of the side effects described in the television commercial including what turned out to be permanent hearing loss. The neurologist told me to continue taking the drug. At an appointment with my primary care physician he called me the “poster child” for side effects for this drug and suggested I stop taking it. The neurologist reluctantly agreed and put me on another very potent nationally advertised drug. I immediately began experiencing many of the severe side effects of that drug. When I complained to the neurologist her advice was to reduce the dosage of the new drug and take a reduced dose of the other drug at the same time! My primary care doctor couldn’t believe it. Subsequently I’ve learned I have permanent nerve damage which neither drug prescribed by the neurologist can improve. Plus now I’ve lost 20% of my hearing as a result of taking the drugs in addition to other impairment of my nervous system.
My mother lived nine years with congestive heart failure after a massive heart attack. Her cardiologist, pulmonologist and oncologist worked closely together balancing her medicines to give her a reasonably good quality of life despite her condition. Last year my father became ill and could not care for her so she was moved to the skilled nursing center of their retirement community while he recovered. While there, the primary care physician at the nursing center changed her medications without consulting her other doctors. She died in three days.
My father was diagnosed with a tumor in the sinus cavity which was surgically removed. The tumor was sent to a lab for a pathology report. The lab lost the tissue and was unable to give a report so the doctors did not know if the tumor was malignant. The doctors recommended he have radiation treatment anyway, which he did. The radiation destroyed his saliva glands and sense of taste.
As an aside, I am self employed and pay for a private medical insurance plan that has a very high deductible and pays for nothing until the deductible is met. My insurance was cancelled last year because it was not Obamacare compliant. My new ACA compliant policy has an even higher deductible and higher copay after the deductible is met. Plus the monthly premium cost is 71% higher. For the past two years my out of pocket cost for deductibles, copays and insurance has exceeded $20,000 per year. You can bet I question every procedure and drug prescribed by my medical providers.
Do I have a grind against the medical community? What could possibly make you think that?
“and not directed at you”
“what you think you are sounding smart on”
So it’s not a personal attack but it is.
What you did here is exactly what all the Alinskyite democrats do. Do the opposite of what they say, or say the opposite of what they do. Thinking it will defuse or somehow balance out their attacks and lies. What they fail to understand is that human language does not and cannot create reality.
What really stands out most about your comments is an emotional and unfounded vitriol against all doctors, based on unsupported statements that most of them commit medicare fraud.
But fraud in government funding occurs on all sides—by the recipients of medicare, by a very few doctors, and by the government bureaucrats managing it.
But your emotion is directed at doctors, and because it paints with such a broad brush this tells me there is another agenda behind your anti-doctor tirade.
Wherever fraud exists in a government program, the first place to look for wrongdoing is at the source—the government bureaucrats.
If they can’t manage their own programs, holding government accountable, starting with public discussions like this, comes before anything else. Logically and ethically.
You said:
‘...vitriol against all doctors, based on unsupported statements that most of them commit medicare fraud.’
But fraud in government funding occurs on all sides—by the recipients of medicare, by a very few doctors, and by the government bureaucrats managing it.
But your emotion is directed at doctors
In 1982, Hospitals were told that doctors had been ripping off medicare to the extent that it was bankrupt and that patients were actually going to have to shorten hospital stays and that the governmnet would be in charge of that, overseeing the insurance industry who would make the call...’
Nope. I never stated that most doctors are responsible.
I talk about the system only. They are caught up in it.
And YOUR unfounded statements based on feelings and wishes, no documentation are easily refuted with at least the document I posted:
‘The Impact of Health Care Fraud on the United States ...’
Which you can google and in which you will find a 1997 finding that:
‘medical providers are responsible for 72 percent of health care fraud...’
Here’s something quite typical, from post #17:
My doc sees me for two to three minutes per visit and charges medicare for an “extended visit”, every time.
$130, medicare pays 80%, I pay 20%.’
My point is that since the early 1980s, you can read it in my post #2, which I am wasting my time rewriting, but I’ll do it, Medicare has been bankrupt far sooner than expected due to the enormous fraud.
That is where the DSM came from. Insurance companies and medicare at that point no longer allowed doctors to be in charge of who stayed, how long they stayed, what treatments they got, and how much money was reimbursed. It was over then. And since then, the fraud has not abated to a degree that made medicare solvent, and the DSM cannot keep up.
I stated clearly that medicare and government funding was not a good way to go to begin with, but fraud and pretending it was money that grew on trees was not helping.
And I am also stating that the public better get ready for the fact that the days are short where a lifelong drug and alcohol abuser gets a week long stay in a private room with all the meds known to alleviate DTs, renal and liver failure, anxiety, pain, bleeding, head injuries from falling down in a drunken stupor and paid for by the government after a life of no employment due to the enabling nature of our socialism which certainly extends into our medical system which is so sick itself that this horrible president moved in on like a parasite but found it too sick to feed off of any longer.
Watch Obamacare fizzle out.
Oh, I didn’t mean I wasn’t directing ANY of it on you. I meant that your statement was so incoherent that I was responding just for the sake of anyone who might take you criticism of me as having any merit.
The only sick part of our medical system is caused by the extent to which government is involved in it.
The only sick part of our medical system is caused by the extent to which government is involved in it.
Most doctors don’t commit fraud.
Most people don’t share your anti-doctor bias.
Most people don’t take responsibility for their own health
Most people don’t realize Medicare has been in bankruptcy since the early eighties
And most people have no idea what the story is, and how this medical system will crack under its own weight, proof being how reluctant you are to even read anything on this including the documentation I spoonfed
My mother-in-law (now retired) used to work in billing and coding for hospitals. With the horror stories she told, it’s a miracle anyone goes into medicine.
I did not know you could retire from being a mother-in-law!
I’m thinking of leaving the dead-end field of advanced computer programming, and entering the wonderful burgeoning field of medicine!
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