Obama hit close to home today for my office.

[Raven]

First of all, we're sitting there watching Portsmouth live and mumbling "Jeeze, I just love this guy" and then he describes the routine where you get the tests, get sent to a specialist, get the same tests again and so on and so on. My office mate and I just stare at eachother. Obama is describing her ordeal with breast cancer to a tee. TO A TEE. He might as well have been there when she went through all of this stuff.

And then she turns to me and says "Remember when I had those 3 MRI's?"

He man knows this stuff. He is listening.

[HopeOverFear]

1. man

[tinrobot]

2. Obama was there when his mother went through this stuff

He knows how the system really works.

[BlooInBloo]

3. Efficiency and prevention can be ginormous cost savers...

Although the latter can be difficult to quantify.

[JayMusgrove]

4. I like your word, "ginormous" !! n/t

[BlooInBloo]

9. Heh. Not my mash-up. It's standard internet-ese.

[NYC_SKP]

5. From what I've witnessed, costs are bloated about 100% due to bullshit and mishandling.

Not even by profits but by misdiagnosis and poor communication and shit like that there.

:mad:

[FLyellowdog]

7. Don't some doctors get paid by the quantity of tests they order?

Often medical bills to patients are negotiable depending on whether you have insurance or not. With insurance, a procedure is more expensive. Without insurance, cost to patient is less. Looks like a procedure is a procedure is a procedure. If acutal costs to have your appendix out is $12,000, then that's what it should cost...not $35,000 just because your insurance is going to pay. Insurance companies are fraudulent and money hungry beasts. I once told my coverage company about a double billing (over $5,000) for a procedure that hospital claimed I had done twice but hadn't...insurance paid it anyway!!!!! What's up with that? Health Care needs reforming...NOW!

[KoKo]

11. That's a good point. Actually though ...without insurance it's more...the difference is

between what Medicare would pay and what your insurance pays. Study posted on DU today says Medicare is cheaper for the same procedure you would have with your private insurance. Sorry...I don't have the link...you might Google the comparison if you are interested... But, your point is good. The kickbacks from "private insurance" jack up the price paid to doctor. It's a big difference and why some have said some doctors don't want Medicare Patients and why Medicare patients have been forced to add on costly "Advantage Programs."

[Cha]

6. I've never had any encounter

with what you've experienced but when I heard the president say that I knew he had been deep into this, too.

And, his mom did have to deal with insurance companies when she was in her sick bed with ovarian cancer because they were accusing her of having a pre existing condition!

[a la izquierda]

12. Today I heard a story at a Town Hall...

about woman with rheumatoid arthritis. Her insurance company told her they wouldn't cover her pregnancy because it was a pre-existing condition. To rheumatoid arthritis.

I guess I'm never getting pregnant...

[PatSeg]

8. I think many people can relate to this

I also remember times when tests were ordered that weren't requested. A few years ago I had to get a blood test and an EKG for an out patient surgery. The doctor I went to order several other tests (that my insurance covered of course). I explained that they weren't required, but he said he "was the doctor" and ordered them anyway. Well, that is how the medical group makes money off of the insurance company.

That was a minor example, but I can remember years ago doctors at one hospital going "test crazy" and it often felt like they did it because they COULD, not because it was needed.

[Better Today]

10. So I don't understand something. . . .

Granted, I haven't seen a Dr since 1991, but back then if one doctor ordered something that was already tested by another, I always refused and had the first tests forwarded to the second doctor. Why is it that we as consumers aren't doing this.

Just for the record, I want single payer, I'm not trying to suggest it is always our fault that there are extra unnecessary duplication of efforts. I'm just a tad confused why anyone would have two or three MRIs for the same condition.

[Wednesdays]

13. K&R

:kick: