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Forums - General - Explanation of U.S. healthcare costs.

senseinobaka on 05 September 2008
ManusJustus said:
senseinobaka said:

See, this is the attitude about liberalism I hate so very much. It's your body, your life, your health and ultimately your responsibility. In what insane world would it be considered a good idea to transfer responsibility of ones life to someone else?

What, they hang a MD and State liscense on the wall and suddenly my health is their responsibility?  It's all a matter of cracking a book open, which is something the general public can do last time I checked.

 

These statements are mind-blowingly foolish.  If I could pinpoint what it is about conservatives like you (not all conservatives), it would have to be your inability to think and teh fantasy world you live in.

Yes, that MD and board liscenses on their wall makes your health their responsibility.  You cannot do their job, you do not have the knowledge to do so.  To think that being a doctor takes opening a book is horribly ignorant, it takes 8 years of school plus several more years of residency under the supervision of other doctors before you can become your own practicing physician.  And even then you dont know enough, you have to keep up with new medical practices and technology for the rest of your practicing life.

You do have a responsibilty for your own healthcare, but it is not prescribing yourself drugs or deciding which method of surgery you want, its following up on what the doctor advises.  Take your medicine as instructed, go to rehab when instructed, dont eat foods that the doctor tells you are bad, that is your responsibility.

I'm pretty sure you're missing the point. I'm not saying people need to become MDs. But if a doctor diagnosises you with a disease or prescribes meds comprehensive information is readily and easily available. Second opinions are also available. Simply put, your claim that someone cannot make an informed decision about their own health is wrong. And blindly following the instructions of a person as you describe is not taking responsibility. Such an attitude can be deadly. In fact, it may be a good idea to read up on the Milgram experiemnt ( http://www.cracked.com/article_16239_p2.html ).

You can ask that certain medicines be prescribed or ask for an explanation of the differences between two drugs and doctors are required to tell. Same thing for surgical procedures. My doctor has recommended that I get a Tonsilectomy and I have identified about a dozen different technigues that I know I'm going to ask her about. And if she refuses to use the technique I want I will find a doctor that will take a knife to my body in the manner I want.

Also, PLEASE learn how to use a political chart. I'm saying the choices and responsibility and liberty lies in the hands of people, which is a libertarian view not a conservative.

 



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senseinobaka on 05 September 2008
steven787 said:
senseinobaka said:
steven787 said:

It's not the executives or businesses' fault.  It is their job to do every thing legally possible to maximize profit. 

Some of the laws need to change. 

Some ideas, not the only things, not all necessary - all will allow the U.S. to attract and retain the best doctors in the world:

FDA approval processes need to get less political.

Drug producers should be forced to license out their drugs (let others produce it) or the process should be made public (not for producing copies but for research openness), for a reasonable fee instead of keeping a monopoly.  But extend the patent time, so they can keep making those smaller profits longer.

Make price caps illegal, all they do is set a minimum - and do not keep prices down.

Return to health insurance instead of managed care.

For high cost procedures, over let's say $200k, the type that would bankrupt almost every american, add in a government funding.  Nobody is doing these electively.  I am not for completely socialized medicine, but people should not have to choose between death and bankruptcy; food or prescriptions.

Force private practitioners to do a of specific type and amount of pro-bono work if they charge over a certain amount or do a lot of elective procedures (plastic surgery, cosmetic dermatology).

Subsidize health care - tax rebates (both Obama and McCain are pushing a type of this).

Do not allow HCP's to deny life saving procedures - but government should pay part of the most costly procedures.

Make many common Perscriptions OTC, like every other country.

 

These may or may not be right, but Americans should be talking about it, and they don't because they are afraid.

 

I'd like to offer a different view on this. I dont think the problems are the hospitals and doctors. It's also not a problem of the pharma companies. If anything it's the Insurance companies and government.

Health Care is wrapped in it's own protected and seperated market. One that has been allowed to out run inflation. So I think the following changes will have the best results in reducing prices.

1)remove the legislation that allows hospitals/clinics to not advertise prices

2)reform insurance to follow a sane model. Make it like car insurance. Cover for trauma and and expensive procedures that would bankrupt a person.

3)offer transient aide to people in circumstances that make premiums impossible to pay

4)stop employer shopping. allow a person to shop for and find insurance they need. if an employer wants to offer to pay for the insurance a person has purchased as an attracted method, then fine.

5)remove the facism. Stop passing laws that requires me, a male, to have maternal coverage.

6)allow ERs to turn away people who are not in an emergency situation.b

 

First, I wanted to point the underlined parts out.  We agree.

 

Second- the bolded parts are very good ideas.  2) is a good idea, but I already said that. 5) Isn't a federal law.  Florida has no requirements.

You have obviously given this much more thought and time than me.  Kudos.

Thanks. I look at it from an economy/economist POV, albiet amateur. So my propositions are designed to free the market while not removing safety regulations. It's a different POV than most share.

 



_____________________________________________________

Check out the VGC Crunch this Podcast and Blog at www.tsnetcast.com

ManusJustus on 05 September 2008
senseinobaka said:

If a doctor diagnosises you with a disease or prescribes meds comprehensive information is readily and easily available. Second opinions are also available.

You can ask that certain medicines be prescribed or ask for an explanation of the differences between two drugs and doctors are required to tell. Same thing for surgical procedures. My doctor has recommended that I get a Tonsilectomy and I have identified about a dozen different technigues that I know I'm going to ask her about. And if she refuses to use the technique I want I will find a doctor that will take a knife to my body in the manner I want.

Doctors will tell you everything about your disease and you can read up on it all you want, but you cannot make the decision yourself because only your doctor has enough knowledge to do so.  Would you make a decision about how strong the steel frames should be on a sky scraper?  No, because you aren't a structural engineer and aren't able to make a good decision.  Same applies to medicine.

Your doctor knows more about Tonsilectomies than you will ever dream about knowing.  For each patient there are countless variables and methods that a doctor takes into account when deciding the best course of action.  Maybe you want microscopic surgery on your knee because you dont want a big scar but your doctor knows that the specific injured area is large and would make this method more difficult, maybe you want to surgical remove a tumor to but your doctor wants to try chemotherapy first because of your heart condition.  Again, these are extremely simple examples that a doctor would consider when making a decision.



Kasz216 on 05 September 2008
ManusJustus said:
Kasz216 said:

Each healthcare claim needs to be processed by a person.... they need supervisors above them... and they need people above them to make sure the supervisors are doing their job and aren't scamming money out of the system via fake claims.  I

You need people to call and investigate claims that seem messed up.  Like making sure people dont have ongoing perscriptions for drugs 5 times what anyone would need. (pain killer drug dealers.)

You need to correlate said claims to make sure that hospitals don't have too many coincidences of treating the same thing and investigating those.

You need to have customer service representatives to handle everyone that will call.

Everything you describe is taken into account by 'per capita.'  You only need 1 customer service representative for 500 customers, you only need 1 lawyer for 1000 people.  The more people you have the more of these jobs you need, which goes in line perfectly with the 'per capita' statistic I used.

Its not like for small countries you need 1 lawyer for every 1000 people and for big countries you need 1 lawyer for every 10 people.

No but you need more overseers.  Who need overseers when the adminstration bridge gets high enough.

Infrastructure of buisnesses are like a Pyramid.  The more people you have on the bottom.  The more layers you ened before you get to the guy on top.

I laid this out a while ago, but you ignored it for some reason.  Those customer service reps need a manager.  Those managers need managers above them... etc.

Compare the emoloyee chain of Walmart vs the employee chain of Pops Drugstore.

The only difference is that a government healthcare office really wouldn't be able to negotiate prices like a Walmart does.