health care gone nuts!

[Gatordoc50]

Other countries have strongly regulated health insurance systems and prices are often set by the government or the systems are run by the government. What factors actually lead to the cost of healthcare being half as much in other countries will be difficult to determine and implement in the US, basically because the ideas are not home grown and that is often reason enough to stay with the status quo.

+1
The disparity exists whether looking at costs per capita, costs as a percentage of GDP, etc. Anyway you slice it, we pay more. We have more healthcare workers than most countries but not significantly more. The only thing I can think of is that our providers target those with the best insurances and benefits, over treating those patients. In other words, a desire to " Maximize Benefits".

 

[tjscott0]

Originally posted by Gatordoc50
I can see that. My personal view is that all Insurance should pay the same for a specific procedure.

So say a gall bladder removal is $2000. I believe the result of such a policy would be doctors moving from high costs locales [NYC, Boston, San Francisco, No Virginia/DC] to low cost locales [Omaha, Topeka]. OK by me. Prolly not ok with power broker whether they be business or political power brokers. Ain't gonna happen.

Now that I think more about it; the best doctors in the high cost locales will simply demand a $5k to $10k annual access fee. I can see revolution forming already.

No methinks the patient needs more skin in the game. No insurance policies with deductibles below $5k. Patients will shop for health care driving non emergency health care costs down.

Oh an aside. One of the reason foreign countries health care is less is that they refuse to pay US prices for drugs.

So are foreign nations paying the "right" price? Or are they riding on the back of US innovation costing the US consumer?

 

[eytonxav]

Originally posted by Gatordoc50
I can see that. My personal view is that all Insurance should pay the same for a specific procedure.

I think we still need a more standardized approach than we have today, but with the ability to adjust the base standard for cost of living differences as you suggest.

 

[haha]

That same economics class also says demand will fall if price goes up and there is lots of evidence this has happened in the US.

I respectfully disagree with your definition of reform. The bill is already being paid. It is about leveling the playing field and enabling or requiring everyone to play with the same rules. Decreasing the bill is critical, but the challenge is to do so without denying health care to people.

I know better than to argue with a moderator, so OK, thanks for your view.

Ha

 

[REWahoo]

I know better than to argue with a moderator...

Wuss.

 

[zaqxsw]

Here is an ad from today. The new medical world once we can no longer afford it! It's already happening. I bet we see a 50% off Groupon for knee replacements within 5 years.......... .

OMG, all of those smart kids will then go be lawyers!!!

 

[Katsmeow]

No methinks the patient needs more skin in the game. No insurance policies with deductibles below $5k. Patients will shop for health care driving non emergency health care costs down.
[/QUOTE]

Good luck with that.  I know plenty of people would like to shop for health care but it is virtually impossible to do it.  Sure for something routine that is done by many places that you know in advance you will need it - you can shop for health care.

Imagine you are having a heart attack.  Not so easy to shop for health care.

Or even if know in advance you need surgery.  It can be absolutely impossible to find out in advance the cost.  I had gall bladder surgery a few years ago and remember trying to find out the cost from the hospital in advance.  They couldn't tell me.  It all depended on how it was coded and no one would know until after the surgery.

Even if you could get the costs for the hospital try getting the costs for every ancillary provider.  I tried very hard to find all this out before hand and missed the assistant surgeon (no one told me about them and it didn't just spring to my mind).

And let's say you could do that - how many of us have the expertise to evaluate the quality of Hospital A which is $1000 less than Hospital B or to know if the anesthesiologist who is $500 is cheaper is just as good as the more expensive anesthesiologist.

I do think that cost information should be more readily available but I don't think it does anything much to drive costs down.

 

[Lsbcal]

Shopping for health care doesn't seem to work for many individual situations.

Example: I went in to the clinic associated with my GP (it was a Saturday). Needed to have a small tick removed from my skin. Had gotten it while gardening. They could not give me a quote. When I got the bill it was $500. Mentioned it to my GP and he just said ... "really?"

 

[youbet]

Oh an aside. One of the reason foreign countries health care is less is that they refuse to pay US prices for drugs.
 
So are foreign nations paying the "right" price? Or are they riding on the back of US innovation costing the US consumer?[/QUOTE]
 
An excellent "aside" tjscott0!
 
While I'm not a fan of gov't price controls in most situations, I do believe that the USA fed gov't needs to take control of drug pricing immediately.  Exported drugs must sell for the same price as those consumed domestically.  And pricing controls must exist to discourage the outlandishly expensive development of so-called "miracle drugs."