what would successful health care reform look like to you?

[mdmc]

I dig a public option myself, but can concede that it just might not be do-able.
I am currently "insured", but spend about $200.oo per month on buy in, co-pays, and deductibles. For me successful health care reform would look like a lower monthly out of pocket medical expenses. If the reform bill gets my out of pocket expenses down to $175.oo I could could consider Obama "successful". Anything more would be a major coup against the corporations (not bloody likely).

What would successful health care reform look like to you?

[John Q. Citizen]

1. A single payer system that contains costs and covers everyone with comprehensive care.

Everybody else around the world can do it except us because the Dems are too scared to try. So they keep trying to pass what has already failed repeatedly.

[timeforpeace]

16. How to contain costs though? Restricting care? Who decides if I get my hip replaced?

[John Q. Citizen]

17. You and your doctor. Ever been to Canada?

[DefenseLawyer]

18. Bob from Blue Cross decides now

If you think otherwise you are mistaken.

[John Q. Citizen]

19. My Aunt wanted to get a hip replacement. She had Kaiser Permanente. They told her no, she was too

old and the rehab time would be so long and painful that she would probably never walk again if she had the surgery.

[mnhtnbb]

33. Bullshit. My 90 year old uncle just had his second hip replaced.

He had his first at age 88. There is a new anterior procedure which is done that doesn't cut
muscles. Not all ortho guys do it; I know I researched it for my own hip replacement and found the ortho guy who did my uncle's for him. You are up walking around the day after surgery. Most people are
walking without a walker or a cane within 2-3 weeks.

That's the problem with being in an HMO and is the reason you want to be able to choose your own
physician.

If your aunt has an extra $40K lying around and wants to spend it on a hip replacement, PM
me and I'll tell you how she can find an ortho guy who does the anterior procedure.

On edit: BTW, the guy who did mine learned how to do the procedure in Canada.

[John Q. Citizen]

39. She's dead now, so it's a moot question. But Kaiser wouldn't OK it when she

wanted it.

[mnhtnbb]

42. I'm sorry to hear that. My point still stands, though. HMO's make

money by denying care. They aren't the place where you'll find MD's doing the latest procedures.
Innovation costs money and that's not their purpose.

[John Q. Citizen]

43. Your point was a good one, certainly.

[cdsilv]

2. single payer for basic services.....

checkups, emergency care, prescriptions. Paid for by expanding medicare. Supplemental policies for dental, 'elective medicine', optical, paid for by private REGULATED insurance.

[Greyhound]

3. HR.676

We have the model, we have the bill, we have the cost and coverage and implementation already to go. The only thing we lack is the political will to do it.

This whole "debate" is nothing but theater to convince us to accept billions more in corporate welfare while millions more citizens needlessly suffer and die over the next decade.

[madville]

4. I've always thought about a single payer system financed by

a national sales tax. The more you consume, the more you wind up paying. Cut the insurance companies and trial lawyers out of the equation and prices/costs would plummet, also provide a government run malpractice insurance program to physicians.

[SmileyRose]

5. medicare for all - private supplementals for those who want it.

I have no problem with insurance companies offering Medicare HMOs to everyone just like they do now or supplementals and add ons. And I want the doctors offices to only have to deal with one billing entity and one set of rules. The administrative costs of fighting with so many companies are killing them.

[SoCalDem]

6. Easy solution

S-Chip for kids until age 21

basic coverage for 22-49..with options added for pregnancy, chronic conditions, catastrophic, etc. (at an extra cost)

50+ medicare , with supplementals for the 20% not covered by medicare.


for the 22-49 people, a comprehensive plan similar to what government employees have, based on INCOME/ASSETS, and funded through payroll deductions..NO employer participation.. the money NOW paid by employers would be immediately given to employees as the raises they had deferred all along.

for the 50-64 entering medicare early, they would pay a sliding scale supplement, based on income.

That should do it.

[newspeak]

36. I like your plan

I think that medicare should be extended for those in their fifties. There are many now who are actually losing their good jobs and benefits who are in their fifties. Also, like the idea of extending the SCHIPP program for children.

[DefenseLawyer]

7. Nationalize the hospitals

expand the VA model to everyone.

[GodlyDemocrat]

12. The VA model is scary, there's no need to nationalize the hospitals

The single payer system with private hospitals will work just fine.

[DefenseLawyer]

13. The question was what I thought, not what I thought you thought.

But thanks. What's so scary about the VA? It actually gets high marks for efficiency and cost containment, despite the urban legends that call it "scary".

[GodlyDemocrat]

21. Walter Reed ... 2006?

VA care is a travesty.

[DefenseLawyer]

22. The problems at Walter Reed

pertained not to the quality of medical treatment for wounded soldiers in the hospital but rather to the level of care for those who are well enough to be outpatients, living in Army housing at Walter Reed. One building was singled out as suffering from ill-repair, including mold on interior walls. Besides that, if I'm not mistaken, Walter Reed is an Army hospital not a VA hospital. You don't know what you are talking about.

[GodlyDemocrat]

24. Investigation of Walter Reed led to findings about the poor care at the VA hospitals

I'll concede that Walter Reed is a DoD hospital, but this scandal ensnared both the DoD and the VA.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walter_Reed_Army_Medical_C...

[newspeak]

37. yeah, some people forget that the * administration

privatized the shit out of the military. You know what has happened in the past eight fekkin years is privatization of some services that used to be provided by the government. Crappy food and tainted water for soldiers to disrespectful security guards at military posts. The same goes with Walter Reed-some of it's services were privatized.

And when I see that damned add against health care, that refers to the post office being incompetent--well, year's ago it was made to stand on it's own for profit organization. I have a friend who works for the PO, some of the crap she has to put up with--they're now total corporate tools.

[mdmc]

27. but the throw away mentality of the neo-cons is no longer in vogue

I hope the new boss will treat our returning troops with the dignity that they deserve. What happened at Walter Reed was based on a refusal to believe war causes pain and suffering. Sure is causes "freedom" in Iraq and Afghanistan, but at a cost. Walter Reed was the result of refusing to believe there is a cost (and not just profits) to war.

[Sgent]

38. Talk to a physician that trained at a VA hospital

and you will probably find a physician that uses the VA system (if they are eligible) to pay for their drugs and nothing else.

The VA does great on certain benchmarks -- those that can be computerized and thus prompted every time a physician logs onto your chart, but look at their surgery survival rates, infection rates, etc. Those aren't publicly released, and there is a reason for it.

[mdmc]

28. thanks for the reply

[billyoc]

8. 676

[sandnsea]

9. Sliding scale premiums

With very low deductibles and co-pays available for very low income people. The House sliding scale looks pretty good, starting at around 1% of income. 12% might be too high on the other end though. As long as we have that, where everybody can afford coverage, people will start paying attention to medical costs and we can move forward from there.

[Faryn Balyncd]

10. A real public option with Medicare pricing of services available to all Americans.

Such a plan would be real reform, and (in the absence of the insurance industry becoming price competitive) would lead to increasing numbers of Americans opting into the public plan.

Anything less (such as a castrated public plan designed to guarantee insurance industry perpetual dominance) would seem to be a step backwards.

[GodlyDemocrat]

11. It would have to be single payer

A multi payer system would lead to Massachusetts and some European countries, where insurance companies are creating artificial shortages.

[TahitiNut]

14. I have Medicare. I believe everyone should have it.

Simple.

[mdmc]

30. but would you consider it a failure if we didn't get single payer

medicaid for all?

That is a high bar for Obama to pass.

[Stinky The Clown]

15. Single payer

I am willing to call a strong public option a reasonable step forward.

[jannyk]

20. Universal Healthcare like I had growing up in

England. Short of that, a strong, affordable Public Option - where the Option is mine!

At the very, very least, I want what our illustrious leaders have!

[Sebastian Doyle]

23. Truly successful would be HR 676. Moderately successful would be a true public option

Anything less than that is a failure.

[dysfunctional press]

25. hr676 it's the only thing that make sense.

obama needs to have a "fireside chat" with the american people, pull out the charts, explain the facts of the situation, and counter every one of the insurance industry's lies with the truth.
polls already show what the american people want- a lot of them just need to be led to an understanding of it.
change(and a black man in a position of power) can be scary for some people...
but luckily- they have pills for that now.

[Jakes Progress]

26. It would look like the hospitals

and doctor's offices and pharmacies that you saw in "Sicko".

Doctors and nurses and pharmacists who do their job because that's what they want to do.

Doctors and nurses and pharmacists who feel sorry for people who live in a greedy, corporate-nation where they have to do without health care.

And not one insurance company in sight.

[The Gunslinger]

29. single payer

[mdmc]

31. looks like we have a high standard for success

[krispos42]

32. "For Sale" signs on buildings owned by Humana

Sigma, Aetna, Blue Cross Blue Shield, etc.

[dana_b]

34. every single person is covered

and pays a percentage based upon their income (ex. you earn > $100,00/yr, you pay 7.5% of income. You earn $75,000-$99,999/yr, you pay 6% of income, and so on). Those making less than some predetermined amount pay nothing. If we have to have insurance companies, they would have NO SAY in what procedures are done. It is up to the doctor and the patient. Period.

My ideal is single payer though. Always has been.

[mnhtnbb]

35. Single payer.

[mdmc]

40. a pretty high bar indeed

[SeeHopeWin]

41. See my post here for your answer...And comments please.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.ph...