Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Here is what is wrong with USA health care...

Starting to get my bills for my 2nd wrist surgery. It is a real eye opener.

A lot of people blame insurance companies, I blame the doctors. I got stitches out 3 weeks ago. They billed the insurance company $140 for literally 2 minutes of work. I wish I made $70 an hour.

They billed the insurance $70 for "supplies" for my cast.

And...I found out today they bill insurance $12,650.00 for my last wrist surgery. I was out for about 45 minutes. In that time they scoped out some scar tissue and installed one pin. I did not even have general anesthesia.

The bill for anesthesia was $720! That was just to numb my arm.

I am convinced that if we didn't have insurance in this country, the doctors wouldn't be able to charge these prices because everyone would tell them to go pound sand, or default.

I am cutting my cast off this Sunday night. I have a follow up appointment Monday to get it removed anyway. I don't want to spend $500 to have someone else cut it off. I figure my $15 tin snips should do the trick.

Anyone want to know what a $25,000 wrist feels like?...Just like a $1.00 wrist. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/crazy.gif" alt="" />

Yep. My wife had an MRI done about a month ago.. Nearly $6,000.

My son wears an insulin pump. About the size of a pack of cigs.. Cost? $6,500... Wife's got one too...

If it wasn't for insurance, it would cost us over $25,000/year JUST for their normal maladies... I'm very lucky that I'm healthy. Fat, but healthy.. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

It's the beer. Gotta blame it on something....

Lawyers are driving the prices, not doctors!

Also, check your math. $140 for 2 minutes work is not $70 per hour, it is $70 per minute!! <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Can't just blame the Dr.'s.They have mucho over head.Starts with the hundreds of thousands 0f $ for college and med school,not to mention 8 or more years of their life.Then the normal expenses of having a bussiness,office,staff etc.But a major factor in the $ is back at the insurance companys,it the monies they have to pay for mal practice insurance!

I can't even imagine then what my hands are worth.. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/crazy.gif" alt="" />

Ooops! I meant $70 a minute.

Yeah, I know doctors spends a lot of money on school, but my wife is in school to be a Dr. in Pharmacy, we will be out $80k in student loans, but she won't be earning what the doctors are charging!


Also, after my first surgery, the wanted me to wear a wrist brace. The place called and said it would be $1900! That is for a brace with a couple straps with velcro, made in China! It was not even custom. I told them I did not want it, and they then said they could charge me as if I didn't have insurance, then it would only be $350. I told them to suck it.

Elf...... priceless!!!

DC, the difference between the $1900 and the $350 is "other people's money!" that is part of what is wrong, here. someone once said, "If you think health care is expensive now, just wait until it is free!" <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Yeah, I figure my $25,000 wrist is actually ten people's $2500 wrists that were never paid for.

The doctors liability insurance premium (thank you lawsuits) is likely more than your salary. Also somehow we seem to have this thought that we should be able to get any ailment cured w/o it costing us a penny.

I'm not saying medical costs aren't crazy high, but I'm pretty sure most of the $ doctors charge isn't going into their pockets.

I saw this on 60 minutes a few weeks back, those without insurance are actually billed more since most insurance companies strike a price list with the hospital. The Hospital makes it up by chargeing the uninsured more than the insured.

Remember the hospitals also have to make back all that free medical they hand out to those unable to pay anything.

Don't know the answer, it is a hell of a mess.

Bingo! Some of those wrists are here illegally too. Our "cheap labor" isn't...

I don't think fellow taxpayers owe me a free wrist surgery, but I do think the costs are unreasonable. A coworker argued with me that we need socialized health care. I told him he could start right now by writing me a check for my medical bills. He failed to see the correlation and said "no, it would be free." He didn't believe that he would be taxed for medical bills whether he was healthy or not. The good news is, if Hillary gets into office, she is going to wipe my ass everyday and get my employer to give me a raise.

I think the biggest part of the problem is that people do not know what it costs. You are the exception. They simply say: do whatever it takes....the insurance will pay. In Asia, you pay for the service and then get your money back from the insurance company. Cost is about a third of what it costs in the US. And this is world class care. My GP over there went to Harvard and Stanford. My Neurosurgeon was a professor from one of the big hospitals (forget which one right now) in California. When you know what it costs, you ask too many questions. JMHO TM

Not in my experience. We don't have insurance. This made me nervous at first, until paying medical bills out of my pocket for almost 2 years. Most places offer a cash discount because they often don't get their money from the insurance companies. My son broke his arm and we got approximately a 66% discount. If you pay your bills on a timely basis, most extend the cash discount, even if you're making payments.

As for lawsuits, most are frivilous, which makes it a real pain for the legitimate ones (my Mom was killed last year due to doctor and nurse negligence). Come to find out this doctor has had 13 other malpractice suits against him and the hospital is notorious for patients catching infection. No one should have to die the way my Mom did. They can't pay enough.

Shortly after Mom died, I had to take my wife to the ER. It was strange. We're conditioned in this country to believe doctors and hospitals have our best interest at heart. I found myself sitting in the waiting room fighting this notion with the fresh pain of Mom's death.

There's no way to easily isolate what THE problem is. Mostly it's the idleness and complacency of the population. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/mad.gif" alt="" />

Scott

I'm in the process of changing dentists. The last few years I've been told I need extra check ups with regular follow ups, and a lot of extras. Recently my company change insurance carriers and the dental went down the tubes. Suddenly my teeth are fine and I only need to come in once a year or so. Right, just farming the insurace co. No wonder the guy owned 5 banks!!!

For those who would like an idea of what gov't health care is like, check out any V.A. hospital. Now, the people who work there are good people, they just have no resources. True to form, what seems to be a good, caring idea, loses appeal when the time comes to pay the bills. Politicians get mileage out of the idea, then can't ask for the amount of $ needed to pull it off properly. (no pun intended)

Of that $25,000.00, insurance will pay about $3,000.00. That is where the contract rate will fall. Thus, hospitals overcharge so that they can get what it is really worth. Insurance actually drives health care costs up because it does away with competition. People don't really care what it costs as long as they only pay there $50 co-pay.

I don't have insurance right now and have run into this. We took our son in for an exam. When we went to pay, the receptionist said "That will be $50." When my wife started to write the check she said "Oh, if you're paying cash, then it's $75."

My grandmother recently had shoulder surgery. Her insurance company was billed $2,500. If she didn't have insurance, it would have been $40,000. This is because insurance companies negotiate a dollar amount that they will cover.

We had catastrophic insurance, $5,000 deductible. Family of three. Over a period of six months the premium went from $160 to over $400. We never made a claim.

I blame most of it on the legal system and the "lawsuit lottery" mentality.

Health Insurance, withholding taxes, social security . . .the fundamental problem is the same. When it is deducted from your paycheck, it almost becomes invisible. If a person's full paycheck was deposited to his account every payday, and he had to actually set money aside and write a check every quarter for his taxes, health insurance, and social security, you can bet there would be some accountability.

Insurance companies don't pay your medical bills. . . .you do. It doesn't make any difference if it is a company "benefit" or you are self-employed and pay in to a plan. The scheme can seem horribly complex, but at the end of the day, the way it works is. . .add up the total claims, add on administrative overhead, add some profit, divide the total by the number of insured and Presto that is the premium. If you work for a company that provides health benefits, your compensation is your wage plus your health benefits. The company doesn't really care if it pays the money to you or some insurance company as long as you are willing to do your job.

The current tax regime, where companies can deduct health insurance premiums, but employees can't is clearly a source of the problems. Tie this BS with the ridiculous legal system and you have a great big problem that politicians can suck off indefinitely.