More than 80% of Americans want overhaul of health system

[sweeps]

Americans spend double what people in other industrialized countries do on health care, but often have more trouble seeing doctors, are the victims of more errors and go without treatment more often.

A Commonwealth Fund survey last year found that Americans spent $6,697 per capita on health care in 2005, or 16 percent of gross domestic product, compared to $3,326 in Canada, or 9.8 percent of GDP.

MSNBC Article

[jIM_Ohio]

The other 20% work for the insurance companies.

[ummabdullah]

Interesting post. My husband helps to develop healthcare in countries such as canada, uk, the middle east and europe which offers free medical care to all residents who inhabit those countries. His expertise is in primary and emergency care which covers a broad range of medical expertise.

I think that a healthcare system like canada will take alot of stress our of peoples life and provide much need medical attention to those millions who are unable to afford it.

[jIM_Ohio]

As an FYI-

the bills came in for my wife and twins.

Wife was in hospital on bedrest for 8 weeks prior to giving birth. The total bill for my wife was a BARGAIN at 35k.

DS1 was born at 28 weeks (and 4 days) gestational age and discharged from same hospital at 37 weeks gestational age. His bill came to about 125k.

DS2 was born at 28 weeks (and 4 days) gestational age. He spent about 4 weeks in that hospital (total bill was 75k), then transferred to another hospital because of complications. He was discharged at 41 weeks gestational age and the stay at hospital 2 was billed to the insurance at 250k.

475k for kids
35k for wife.

Each paid a $100 admittance charge and insurance picked up the rest. $400 total out of pocket.

I am glad I had insurance because this one 4 month period could have derailed all financial goals for the rest of my life.

[LivingAlmostLarge]

Yes, but Jim many americans would want you to have a HDHP. Problem? Sure sounds good that you only pay the deductible say $5k, but then the insurance company would find lots of "extras" that aren't covered and are outside the "deductible". Or prescriptions not covered.

So then the free market healthcare would supposedly make costs "reasonable" but I wonder about that.

[disneysteve]

Jim, I'm actually surprised by how low those hospital bills are.

One problem, among many, with insurance picking up the tab for almost everything is that there is no incentive for the hospital to make sure the bills are accurate. The insurance companies handles thousands and thousands of claims and simply doesn't have the time or manpower to check the bills for accuracy. They just pay them. That results in tens of millions of dollars wasted.

When my wife had surgery a couple of years ago, I reviewed the bill item by item and found over $1,000 in errors on a $28,000 bill that I had removed from the bill, lowering my cost by that amount. Had I not been responsible for any of the bill, or just a small copay, would I have taken the time to do that review and found those errors?

[ummabdullah]

In the uk they take 8% out of your paycheck to pay for healthcare for the entire country. Which means your mother who is retired, wife, children, sister who doesn't work etcr all have healthcare on just that 8%. Good quality healthcare.

It begs belief why the charges in the US are so high when other countries have been able to pay staff and still keep bills so low. There seems to be far too much greed in the American medical system.

[DebtFreeMe2]

I do admit that for basic checkups and such other countries probably have less of a wait, but where it comes to seeing a specialist if you have a real problem, people come to the US for treatment, because we don’t have huge waiting lists.

I think a big problem in with the cost is based on the fact that we pick up the worlds expense for making new drugs. It can cost tens to hundreds of millions of dollars to make these drugs, and someone has to pay for it.

Often as soon as new drugs get to market, there are other countries such as India and China that are immediately looking to copy it and thus undercut any profit the original company could have made. So they make a lot of it one the backs of the US.

If they don't do this, or somehow get international laws that stop countries for steeling there formulas, and then actually get them enforced there will be no incentive to create new drugs that can help people, because there will be no profit.

Along with that we have a belief in the US that if you’re a doctor you must be wealthy, so what happens, the doctors believe that they need to be rich, so they charge prices that get them there. The days of the family doctor that lived a middle class life style started to vanish in the 1950s and I doubt we'll see it again.

Just my thought,

DebtFreeMe2

[disneysteve]

Along with that we have a belief in the US that if you’re a doctor you must be wealthy, so what happens, the doctors believe that they need to be rich, so they charge prices that get them there. The days of the family doctor that lived a middle class life style started to vanish in the 1950s and I doubt we'll see it again

As a family doctor for the past 15 years, I can tell you without a doubt that you are totally off-base here.

1. Doctors don't have much of any say in how much they charge for their services. Reimbursement rates are determined by the government (Medicare and Medicaid) and the insurance companies (which generally use the government rates as their guide).

2. Doctors graduate med school with huge student loan debt today. Debt approaching or exceeding $200,000 is not unusual at all. I owed over $100,000 when I graduated in 1990. That is low by today's norms.

3. While reimbursement has been stagnant or falling, expenses have continued to rise - staff salaries, real estate costs, malpractice insurance, licensing fees, office supplies, etc. That means that doctors' incomes have been falling. I earn the same amount today that I earned 5 years ago, so when you factor in inflation, I have actually seen my effective income fall each year.

The real problem is that the general public still has the very outdated notion that all doctors are wealthy and that doctors complaining about insurance companies and government reimbursement are just rich whiners which couldn't be farther from the truth. I lead a very middle class life - modest home, drive an 11-year old Toyota, send our daughter to public school, shop at discount stores and thrift shops and worry if we are saving enough for the future. And many of my physician peers are just like us so I know we aren't unique.

[gamecock43]

I'm with the 80%

[Sporkman]

I'm with the 80%

Ditto!

The problem I have with the medical industry is the same one I have with the energy industry: The economics, supply chains, management processes, etc, are so complex that few people can possibly understand all of it. When systems are so complex to be beyond the comprehension of most, and when so much money is involved, then there's bound to be "inefficiencies", to put it charitably.

[disneysteve]

The problem I have with the medical industry is the same one I have with the energy industry: The economics, supply chains, management processes, etc, are so complex that few people can possibly understand all of it. When systems are so complex to be beyond the comprehension of most, and when so much money is involved, then there's bound to be "inefficiencies", to put it charitably.

That is true. The whole medical insurance structure and hospital system is very inefficient. What I see often, though, is that patients place the blame on the doctor, when the doctor is just as much a victim of the system as the patient is.

Years ago, before all the insurance company nonsense and litigation issues, a family doctor "chart" generally consisted of a 5 x 8 inch index card. That card provided enough space to record a few dozen office visits over the course of years. An office note might be no more than a half dozen words. The doctor's entire "staff" usually consisted of one nurse who was very frequently his wife. Office vists were $5 but the doctor's overhead was minimal and he was able to earn a very nice living that way.

Today, a typical office vist results in a half-page or longer note. Charts are an inch thick or more. My partner and I have 4 full-time staff members, and that really isn't enough but we can't afford to hire more and don't have any space in our office to put them. They spend hours each day on the phone and computer dealing with insurance companies, doing referrals, getting prior authorizations, appealing payment denials and doing various other things that really have nothing to do with patient care and don't generate much of any income. Procedures that require prior authorization probably get approved over 99% of the time. But still we have to jump through the hoops and waste the time to get the approval. It is horribly inefficient and, worst of all, nobody benefits. It costs us money. It delays treatment for the patient. And it costs the insurance company money since they need to pay a whole department of staffers who do nothing but process prior authorizations all day.

[tripods68]

Same here.

I rather pay 8% of my paycheck towards Universal Health Care. This would eliminate 80% of people who filed BK largely due to rising health care cost and affordability especially those who are unemployed with family to take care of. And yes...i consider myself a conservative.

[moanymoany]

I do admit that for basic checkups and such other countries probably have less of a wait, but where it comes to seeing a specialist if you have a real problem, people come to the US for treatment, because we don’t have huge waiting lists.

I think a big problem in with the cost is based on the fact that we pick up the worlds expense for making new drugs. It can cost tens to hundreds of millions of dollars to make these drugs, and someone has to pay for it.

Often as soon as new drugs get to market, there are other countries such as India and China that are immediately looking to copy it and thus undercut any profit the original company could have made. So they make a lot of it one the backs of the US.

If they don't do this, or somehow get international laws that stop countries for steeling there formulas, and then actually get them enforced there will be no incentive to create new drugs that can help people, because there will be no profit.

Along with that we have a belief in the US that if you’re a doctor you must be wealthy, so what happens, the doctors believe that they need to be rich, so they charge prices that get them there. The days of the family doctor that lived a middle class life style started to vanish in the 1950s and I doubt we'll see it again.

Just my thought,

DebtFreeMe2

You are mistaken if you think the USA creates all the new drugs! I think you will find that drug companies are multinationals and that many new drugs are created in the UK and in France amongst other places. France has an exemplary reputation in the field of healthcare and medical discoveries. It was the French who isolated the HIV virus and shared the knowledge with - as they thought - their partners in the search - the USA - who promply said THEY had made the discovery! Antibiotics were a British invention, as was DNA. We here in Europe have made - and continue to make - our share of medical discoveries.

The French have the best healthcare system in the world. Here in the UK we are way behind them, but still ahead of the USA. The WHO rates the French number 1, the UK number 18 and the USA number 27th. They take into account many factors including the access of the people to healthcare.

In the UK, if you have to stay in hospital when pregnant - PAID, a baby born early with need for considerable medical care - PAID. I have connections with the USA and the healthcare we get here is every bit as good as in the USA.

My mother spent her last 2 weeks in hospital with pneumonia. The care she received was fantastic - specialist nursing care for the dying - PAID.

We here in Europe believe in caring for each other. There is not one European country that does not have an excellent healthcare system. Americans have consistently said no to any kind of national health care system. I have seen the idea described as 'Communistic' we call it 'love thy neighbour'.

[LivingAlmostLarge]

Actually it's switzerland that has the best european drug discovery but they are heavy collarborators with the US. Most Pharma are in the US because the talent is here. But China is catching up FAST. They are opening plants like Merck, Roche, and Pfizer because the talent can't come to the US and they don't like Europe.

Europe lags far behind for sure in Biotech. Big pharma is more Swiss based but Biotech started here. There is a difference bewteen pharma and biotech too pharma is more chemistry based research, while biotech is biologically based drug design.