Replies

It may very well be propaganda.

However, after dealing with my parents’ medical situations and bills I know for a fact that they have been billed by doctors who never saw them or were involved in diagnostics behind the scenes. I have tracked these people down and confronted them on their bills and they have backed down.

This problem is rife in Medicare.

Another problem is hospitals not releasing records of what was done during a stay in the hospital ... test results etc. They tell the patient to “follow up with your doctor” after discharge but there is nothing to follow up with without the information. So the doctors have no information and have to re-order the tests ... sometimes this makes no sense since you don’t have the same problem after your hospital stay as during it.

I’ve had to keep detailed journals of what tests they SAY they are taking my parents out of the room to perform. There is no evidence whatsoever that these tests were performed and the medical records are difficult if not impossible to get to take to the regular out of hospital doctors afterwards.

In one case when my mother was in rehab I and other relatives noticed a man with a white coat come to the door of my mother’s room every couple of days, peer in, and leave. Then weeks later we received bills from some doctor who said he ‘examined’ her on 10 occasions at $111 per exam. Maybe his job is just to diagnose whether the patient was still living or not and he could determine that by just looking in?

The system is corrupt.

That is not to say that the New York Times might be engaging in propaganda ... but some of this stuff goes on I know for a fact. I never would have believed it if I hadn’t seen it for myself.

I really fear getting old and burdening my child with having to keep an eye on things for me when I’m ill as you should NEVER EVER under any circumstances go to a hospital without a personal advocate keeping track of what goes on, especially if you are older.

If you have medical power of attorney for your mom you should not have any trouble at all getting copies of all of her medical files. How do I know? I gave it to my wife and she gets a copy of everything plus the hospitals and specialist doctors send copies to my regular MD so he knows what is going on.

I have seen instances when consultants are called in by the attending physician, such as an infectious disease ( ID) physician or a hospital intensivist. The ID physician mainly looks at your labs and culture results, and orders the correct antibiotics for the patient. They do an essential task, but when patients go home they do not remember the role this physician performed. They then complain to the hospital.
Or,they have had surgery, and the patients blood pressure runs high, or they develop some congestive heart failure. The surgeon is not going to manage that, he /she is going to call the intensivist to manage the BP or CHF issues.
Both instances would result in a patient not having an understanding of the roles those physicians have done in helping them. There are other specialties that also get called in to manage the care of a patient, without the patient knowing, but these consults are essential.
Therefore, the premise of this article is nonsense, and I have never heard of a $100,000 charge for a surgical procedure. .

“The system is corrupt.

That is not to say that the New York Times might be engaging in propaganda ... but some of this stuff goes on I know for a fact. I never would have believed it if I hadn’t seen it for myself.

I really fear getting old and burdening my child with having to keep an eye on things for me when I’m ill as you should NEVER EVER under any circumstances go to a hospital without a personal advocate keeping track of what goes on, especially if you are older.”

More than that Lorainne. To some degree it is pretty much standard procedure in many places these days. And perfectly legal as well.

“you should NEVER EVER under any circumstances go to a hospital without a personal advocate keeping track of what goes on, especially if you are older.”

Truth