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Health Insurance Insider: 'They Dump the Sick'-Retired Health Insurance Executive Blows the Whistle

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kpete Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 05:28 PM
Original message
Health Insurance Insider: 'They Dump the Sick'-Retired Health Insurance Executive Blows the Whistle
Edited on Wed Jun-24-09 05:28 PM by kpete
Source: ABC News

Health Insurance Insider: 'They Dump the Sick'
Retired Health Insurance Executive Blows the Whistle on His Former Industry
Retired health insurance executive Wendell Potter told Congress today that insurance companies routinely rip off customers.
By ALICE GOMSTYN
ABC News Business Unit
June 24, 2009

Frustrated Americans have long complained that their insurance companies valued the all-mighty buck over their health care. Today, a retired insurance executive confirmed their suspicions, arguing that the industry that once employed him regularly rips off its policyholders.
Retired health insurance executive Wendell Potter told Congress today that insurance companies routinely rip off customers.

"They confuse their customers and dump the sick, all so they can satisfy their Wall Street investors," former Cigna senior executive Wendell Potter said during a hearing on health insurance today before the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation.

Potter, who has more than 20 years of experience working in public relations for insurance companies Cigna and Humana, said companies routinely drop seriously ill policyholders so they can meet "Wall Street's relentless profit expectations."


Read more: http://abcnews.go.com/Business/Health/story?id=7911195&page=1
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ejpoeta Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 05:34 PM
Response to Original message
1. how is it any different than the hospitals that were caught dumping patients off
in alleys. it's baloney. and it is exactly why for profit healthcare can't work.... the only way they can make a profit is not providing the service people are paying for. Imagine if you go out to dinner and pay for your dinner but then the waiter comes out and says i'm sorry, but we're kicking you out now. they haven't given you your food that you paid for, but they are kicking you out. what would happen then.... wouldn't they get in trouble for doing that??? but the health insurance company doesn't.
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Indenturedebtor Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 08:03 PM
Response to Reply #1
35. Hospitals all over the country go bankrupt helping people who don't pay
Most of them try to help, and lose everything in the process. It's not the hospitals that you should blame there but the insurance companies.

I work in healthcare IT, specifically in quality improvement, and in "certification" which is trying to get the damn insurance companies to pay. The hospitals do everything they can to treat as many patients as they can.
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Gormy Cuss Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 08:44 PM
Response to Reply #35
43. And there's still no excuse for dumping patients.
IIRC public hospitals aren't the ones dumping patients on the curb. It's for-profit and private non-profits who are beholding to boards and the insurance companies to keep costs in check.
Single-payer would take care of a lot of that pressure.

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Indenturedebtor Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 08:56 PM
Response to Reply #43
45. Some hospitals are nasty. Most, even for-profits take considerable losses
taking care of people that they know can't pay.

They have to be able to stay open. We can't blame the hospitals when we as a society are not willing to make single-payer a priority.
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RollWithIt Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 08:45 PM
Response to Reply #35
44. Agreed, it all boils down to the money....
And a backwards system of rewards. Doctors aren't rewarded for keeping people alive. They're rewarded for minimizing costs and only treating who they have to. It's systemic from the top. The top being the insurance companies.
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bjobotts Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 11:30 PM
Response to Reply #44
54. That's what the big 4state attroney general fiasco was all about. Hospitasl suppliers making Billion
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bjobotts Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 11:31 PM
Response to Reply #54
55. For what another Hosp. equp. supplier could provide for thousands
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bjobotts Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 11:33 PM
Response to Reply #55
56. Gonzales' DoJ sent their own temp USA down to break up the suit,Brad blog covered it all
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bjobotts Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 11:35 PM
Response to Reply #56
57. It was the temp USA for Kansas city MO who also tried to influence the senate race here.
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bjobotts Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 11:37 PM
Response to Reply #57
58. Health ins and equip suppliers have been gouging hosp. and the people to death
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Dulcinea Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Jun-28-09 06:07 PM
Response to Reply #44
98. Insurance companies aren't in business to pay your doctor bills.
They're in business to MAKE MONEY. Pure and simple.
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primavera Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jun-29-09 07:58 AM
Response to Reply #98
103. That's the heart of the problem, alright
And why any healthcare system which relies upon private, for-profit insurance providers is always going to be characterized by patients getting ripped off. Providing better coverage for lower premiums is fundamentally incompatible with a private company's aspiration of maximizing profits.
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Grinchie Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Jun-25-09 04:51 AM
Response to Reply #35
74. I guess thats why Kaiser can't print a decent Pharmacy receipt.
I assume that printing out an indecipherable string of numbers that are meaningless without a decober book saves them lots of money.

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wolfgangmo Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Jun-25-09 05:36 PM
Response to Reply #35
87. Absolutely
While you can point to a few examples of bad behavior by hospital, clinics or doctors, on the whole they try their hardest for patients. Most health care providers actually care.

THe insurance companies are the real culprits here. They make Walmart look like an angel by comparison.

And note what the article said, "the relentless demands of wallstreet." It seems that everything wrong in America can be traced back to wallstreet greed. Wallstreet needs to be reigned in and chained down in the basement.
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Duer 157099 Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 05:37 PM
Response to Original message
2. This is news?
:shrug:
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nashville_brook Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 06:20 PM
Response to Reply #2
10. it's news that Congress is actually holding hearings to get the truth.
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LaurenG Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Jun-25-09 02:46 AM
Response to Reply #2
73. It's news that one of their own are admitting it, openly. nt
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Oregone Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 05:37 PM
Response to Original message
3. Ok, but Obama is going to put a band-aid on these companies
Were going to make this work. Right
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Amonester Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 10:53 PM
Response to Reply #3
53. No. He's going to throw billions their way, and...
he'll just 'ask' them 'politely' that they stop being greedy bastards.


ooops... I forgot.... these bastards are not Bankers... but they're Bastards of another kind, albeit, very similar.
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pleah Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 05:41 PM
Response to Original message
4. Most people already know that they do this. Why doesn't our
Congress people? Do they live with their heads up their asses?

But, they want to protect the insurance industry at all costs. :grr:
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Dragonfli Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Jun-25-09 01:07 AM
Response to Reply #4
65. I am sure they know, with a very few exceptions they probably just don't care
Poor people don't put money in their pockets, those that profit off the pain of others do.

They would protect any serial killer that had a large enough check as they are proving with their deep concern with the well being of the insurance companies.

I don't care what letter they wear on their jerseys, the offending politicians need to be voted out and publicly shamed as the machiavellian murder accomplices that they are.

:grr:
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slipslidingaway Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 05:56 PM
Response to Original message
5. In a recent poll only 7% thought the HC industry was trustworthy...
http://energycommerce.house.gov/Press_111/20090624/testimony_wolfe.pdf

Testimony of Sidney M. Wolfe MD
Acting President, Public Citizen and Director, Health Research Group at Public Citizen
Before the Subcommittee on Health
House Committee on Energy and Commerce
Hearing on Health Insurance
June 24, 2009


"...A recent national Harris Poll (October, 2008) asked the following question: “Which of these industries do you think are generally honest and trustworthy – so that you normally believe a statement by a company in that industry?” Only one out of 14 people (7%) thought that the health insurance industry is honest and trustworthy. The only industries in the survey that were even more distrusted than the health insurance industry were HMO’s (7%), oil (4%) and tobacco (3%).

The Congress, on the other hand, trusts the health insurance industry and feels compelled to come up with a “solution” that avoids a big fight with them, not only writing them into the legislation but assuring further growth of that industry. The Congress wants to believe that the health insurance and pharmaceutical industries will be good citizens and voluntarily lower their prices to save some of the money that is necessary to fund health insurance. Several weeks ago, the collective forces of the health industry promised that they could voluntarily save two trillion dollars over the next 10 years.

But the amount that can be saved over the next ten years by just eliminating the health insurance industry and the $400 billion of excessive administrative costs it causes each year is $4 trillion, in one fell swoop. This would be enough to finance health care for all without the additional revenues the Congress and the Administration is desperately seeking..."




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Kaleko Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 06:01 PM
Response to Original message
6. Confirmation of what we already know. K & R
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slipslidingaway Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 06:06 PM
Response to Original message
7. Link to written statement....
http://www.pnhp.org/news/2009/june/the_health_care_indu.php

"...I decided to take the shingle down, though, at least for a while, when I heard members of Congress reciting talking points like the ones I used to write to scare people away from real reform. I’ll have more to say about that over the coming weeks and months, but, for now, remember this: whenever you hear a politician or pundit use the term “government-run health care” and warn that the creation of a public health insurance option that would compete with private insurers (or heaven forbid, a single-payer system like the one Canada has) will “lead us down the path to socialism,” know that the original source of the sound bite most likely was some flack like I used to be.

Bottom line: I ultimately decided the stakes are too high for me to just sit on the sidelines and let the special interests win again. So I have joined forces with thousands of other Americans who are trying to persuade our lawmakers to listen to us for a change, not just to the insurance and drug company executives who are spending millions to shape reform to benefit them and the Wall Street hedge fund managers they are beholden to.

Take it from me, a former insider, who knows what really motivates those folks. You need to know where the hard-earned money you pay in health insurance premiums — if you lucky enough to have coverage at all — really goes..."



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HowHasItComeToThis Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 08:28 PM
Response to Reply #7
42. IT IS PUMPED INTO WALL STREET
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Technowitch Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 06:07 PM
Response to Original message
8. No surprise here...
Congressional testimony indicated pretty much the same thing.
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Faygo Kid Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 06:16 PM
Response to Original message
9. That's why we must have a public option
I'm in my 50s. My daughter is just past 30. Whose business do you think the damned insurance companies want?
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Joanne98 Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 06:23 PM
Response to Original message
11. Kill the patients, beat the street!
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wryter2000 Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 06:28 PM
Response to Original message
12. Thank heaven he's speaking out
I wonder if this will get any time on the noooze tonight. La Katie did a real hit piece on the public option last night.
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AwakeAtLast Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 06:34 PM
Response to Original message
13. I hope he isn't scheduling any flights anytime soon......
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bertman Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 07:52 PM
Response to Reply #13
29. Yeah, AwakeAtLast, I was thinking that Mr. Potter might be having a very serious illness
any day now.

But thank goodness he's willing to stand up now and tell the truth for all to hear.

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Zhade Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 06:35 PM
Response to Original message
14. um...
Edited on Wed Jun-24-09 06:48 PM by Zhade


This is why it's insane to put health care decisions in the hands of those whose job is to DENY care to fatten the corporate bottom line (and hence, why Obama's planned Insurance Care is an epic failure)!

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Jkid Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 06:38 PM
Response to Original message
15. It merely confirms what we need: Single-payer health care or expand medicare for all Americans
Kill the private insurance industry with fire!
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Lydia Leftcoast Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 06:38 PM
Response to Original message
16. This is also why my health insurance premiums have doubled
in the past six years, even though I have raised my deductible two categories, in spite of the fact that my company is allegedly "non-profit." I think they let the profit-making companies set the prices and then match them.
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susanr516 Donating Member (823 posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 06:47 PM
Response to Original message
17. Health insurance is simply
legalized extortion.
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Zhade Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 09:19 PM
Response to Reply #17
49. I'm repeating myself here in the hopes that others will understand...


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wolfgangmo Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Jun-25-09 05:41 PM
Response to Reply #49
88. In Canada
They only let one class of person make medical decisions. That would be doctors.

Here in the Excited States of Merica we let minimum wage clerks override medical decisions.

We either need single payer or just admit that we have given up and let computers programed by Diebold make all the medical calls.
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JerseygirlCT Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Jun-25-09 08:23 PM
Response to Reply #49
92. Yup
the system now is set up to incent the wrong things.
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Lorien Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Jun-28-09 06:27 PM
Response to Reply #49
99. Amen nt.
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lefthandedlefty Donating Member (247 posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 06:49 PM
Response to Original message
18. In the words of Gomer Pyle Surprise Surprise!!!!!!!!!
A person would be pretty naive to think any insurance company has the customers best intrest at heart.
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bjobotts Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 11:43 PM
Response to Reply #18
59. Millionaires talking about HC ins reform is laughable. It won't affect them either way
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bjobotts Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 11:56 PM
Response to Reply #59
60. reform means no more massive profiteering supported by denying coverage.
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winyanstaz Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 06:57 PM
Response to Original message
19. Here is another way they do it...
I am a widow.
The insurance companies sometimes send a notice that if you dont reply to?? They will drop you from the rolls and stop billing you.
When they do this to the elderly while they are sick or hospitalized, often the notice goes un-noticed, especially if the one in the hospital is the one that usually pays the bills.
If no one catches that one bill is missing each month..there goes the insurance ..and often the home, even after over 20 years of paying for the policy.
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snappyturtle Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 07:02 PM
Response to Reply #19
20. How sad. Hope you haven't learned this from personal experience with these
RATS! Thanks for the heads up!!
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winyanstaz Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 07:22 PM
Response to Reply #20
24. I am sad to say I did...however..
I hope by speaking up I save someone else down the road.
One thing I cannot stress too much.
If your loved one starts being ill...even if it "means a lot to them" to be able to at least make out the checks to pay the bills..dont let them do it without you standing right there.
If I could have kept our home for a short while, I could have gotten help in keeping it and it could have been a place for my family during hard times as there was land, water and an orchard.
It all happens fast so you have to be ready.
Fortunatly I have a loving family and I can earn my way still in the world. Not all elderly are as fortunate.
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snappyturtle Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 08:24 PM
Response to Reply #24
40. Oh, I am SO sorry! I'm sure everyone who read your reply has
learned very important information and will tuck it away in case life takes them in that direction. Sincerely...thank you. So sorry for your loss of your loved one and your home.
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gleaner Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Jun-25-09 06:42 PM
Response to Reply #24
90. I learned the hard way too...
Last year my husband was hospitalized with MRSA. It was in his blood and all through his body. MRSA is a super bug, a Staph infection which used to be mostly contracted in hospitals and medical settings where the bacteria became antibiotic resistant. It is now "in the wild" as the hospital put it. This means that it is everywhere and as easy to catch as a cold by hand to hand contact or sneezing in someone's face. The doctors described it to me as aggressive and quick to mutate. In the meantime they were dumping every antibiotic they knew of into my husband that would possibly kill it. Each one would work for a short time and then they would have to try something new.

While they were attempting to help my husband he was running a fever of 105 or higher which they could not keep down no matter what they did, and they did try. The day he was taken to the hospital he lost his ability to walk and the use of his left arm. To this day no one knows why.

In the ER he began having a heart attack which they could do little to stop because any acute intervention would have introduced MRSA bacteria into other organs and they were afraid that would kill my husband outright. They happened to have a very good cardiologist on hand who was able to mitigate the severity of the attack while they kept trying to kill the bacteria in ICU. My husband lived, but barely and he has no memory of his time in the hospital. This is very long, I know, so please bear with me. There is a point I'm coming to.

While the MRSA raged unchecked the following happened:

1. It destroyed the heart valve below the Aorta rendering my husband virtually unable to breathe even with oxygen. It inflamed the heart muscle causing endocarditis. There was also an infarct at the apex of the heart itself. He had blood clots in his legs.

2. His lungs were damaged by the bacteria. There is an area at the base of each lung which is scarred and dead. No treatment was able to be given.

3. The doctors had to risk open heart surgery to save my husband's life. Without a valve replacement he would have died. There was a very good chance he could have died during surgery, but he did survive. The heart surgery was only a partial success. The valve was replaced, the infarct could not be bypassed because of its position and the heart rhythm was so out of sync that an ICD which is a combination pacemaker and defibrillator had to be installed to restore the rhythm and fibrillate the heart if it went severely out of rhythm. My husband has had to modify his life activities even more to accommodate the restrictions it brings with it, but he is grateful to be alive.

4. The MRSA attacked my husband's bone marrow. It reduced red counts, white count and platelet count. For a time his white count was so low that in addition to wearing contagion garments when we visited him, we had to wear masks to protect him. His food had to be irradiated before he could eat and he could not have raw food of any kind. His mouth filled with lesions and yeast overgrowth which could be treated only topically because the Hematologist had to protect the bone marrow so that it could return to normal one day. It has improved, but the counts are still low across the board after a year. He had five transfusions during this period in an attempt to restore at least part of his blood count, but they were not successful.

5. After the heart surgery, the pathologist who examined the destroyed heart valve which had been removed found "a few" live MRSA cells on it. The doctors explained that caution dictated that they put my husband on Vancomycin because the fact that the bacteria were not showing in the blood cultures did not guarantee that it would not return. Vancomycin for six weeks was the required and specific protocol. My husband was given Vancomycin.

6. After barely a month my husband had an anaphylactic reaction to the Vancomycin. His whole body swelled. His kidneys were damaged to the point that the doctors were discussing dialasis. Fortunately, the toxicity declined to the point where that was not necessary. There is still some residual kidney damage, but the doctors tell us it may resolve itself in time.

7. My husband's liver was damaged by either the Vancomycin or the MRSA. Some doctors say one thing, and some another. His reality is that ammonia from kidney wastes and liver function is not metabolized properly which resulted in a severe intoxication which resembled dementia. He will have to take medicine three times a day for this for the rest of his life. No one knows for sure if the damage to the liver will restore itself.

8. My husband can now walk a little, but barely. He needs the help of a walker and he can't get very far. He can't stand or sit very long and still spends many hours in a hospital bed. I'm just grateful that he is alive.

Now the point of this. He is a retired federal employee who is only 55 years old and who was robustly healthy before the MRSA. He has private health insurance through the Office of Personnel Management. Throughout this ordeal which lasted for months they kept refusing to pay for the acute care he needed. They wanted him to go to a convalescent hospital, even though they do not pay for that kind of facility, and the reduction of care probably would have resulted in his death. When I asked them if they had considered the lack of this coverage before making the decision their reply was, "We never consider the coverage when we make our decisions."

I was able to get the hospital which is a "non-profit" to help me with this. They appealed for us twice and won so that he was able to get most of the care that he needed and a hospital bed at home and a machine to help him breathe while he is asleep to keep some of the strain off his heart. His doctors wanted him to have home health care with a nurse to check on him once a week and physical therapy as needed. The insurance company has steadfastly refused to authorize this, even though these benefits are covered. Nothing I can do or say will change this, and I have been fighting them as hard as I can.

We have also been left with a huge residue of debt from deductibles and co-payments which we can't even begin to address. We were going to refinance our home under the existing 30 year mortgage which we thought had left us a tidy equity. Unfortunately the Bush economic polices have reduced the value of our home until there is no equity and no way even to sell it. In essence we are paying rent to the mortgage holder.

My husband has to take a lot of new and expensive medications and he has to eat a special diet to stay alive which is expensive, so we are incurring more debt. There seems to be no way out. All we can do is try to catch up, hope that we can continue to pay the mortgage so we don't lose our home because we have nowhere else to go, and let the people we owe money to ruin our credit or whatever they feel they have to do to sufficiently punish us because one of us got desperately ill.

That, I guess is my point. Under the present health care system even if you think you are protected you are not. We need universal health care. This is not a new revelation for me. I thought so even before this happened, but sometimes it is hard to get the people with the power to change things to listen, much less act. If you read with me through this whole post, thanks for your patience and kindness and please realize that you are vulnerable too. Even with the help of an epidemiologist the hospital could not determine where or how my husband was infected. Somewhere out there in "the wild" as the ICU nurse said, but no one knows exactly where or how.
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Delphinus Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jun-29-09 08:01 AM
Response to Reply #90
104. Oh my goodness!
What an ordeal for both you and your husband. :hug:

I thank you for sharing it with us - it needed every detail you put in there.

Welcome to DU world.
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truedelphi Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 07:12 PM
Response to Reply #19
21. That IS A TERRIBLE FACT TO CONSIDER.
I hope you did not learn about this from experience.
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aquart Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 08:10 PM
Response to Reply #19
38. Don't ever tell anyone when you are going on vacation or to the hospital.
Especially not your financial broker or insurance agent.

They deliberately send notices to you when you can't see them.
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RobinA Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Jun-25-09 10:33 AM
Response to Reply #38
80. But Wait!
When I received a shut-off notice from my credit card company due to ONE payment they thought was late (in fact, I had paid it a day early because I was going on vacation, Oh My!) and I called them to find out what the problem was, they told me that in the future if I had to pay early I should call them up to make special arrangements?!?!
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wolfgangmo Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Jun-25-09 05:43 PM
Response to Reply #80
89. To which you replied ...
... "Can I talk to someone not taking meth, please?"
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Zorra Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 07:12 PM
Response to Original message
22. So the Congressional opponents of public healthcare support a system of legalized murder,
Edited on Wed Jun-24-09 07:12 PM by Zorra
because they got paid big bucks by the Insurance industry. That makes them hired killers, in a way.

How disgusting. These heinous, corrupt companies need to be put out of business.
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MasonJar Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 07:18 PM
Response to Original message
23. Hey, Senators, maybe you should pay some attention for a change
Edited on Wed Jun-24-09 07:20 PM by MasonJar
now that the people have an insider ally. The House is on top of this. If the Senate cannot get a handle on what is best for America instead of Wall Street and the health insurance and big pharma industry, I vote that we replace them with the more cognizant House members. Obama, I put you in the Senate category, by the way.
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truedelphi Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Jun-25-09 01:21 AM
Response to Reply #23
69. You say -"If the Senate cannot get a handle on what is best for America..."
Edited on Thu Jun-25-09 01:24 AM by truedelphi
Why do we keep on having to HOPE and FIGHT and WISH for what citizens in nations that are run fairly and honestly just have handed to them?
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Seldona Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 07:31 PM
Response to Original message
25. K&R
The profits of death. It works both ways really.
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JohnWxy Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 07:46 PM
Response to Original message
26. RECOMMENDED.
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ima_sinnic Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 07:46 PM
Response to Original message
27. like Congress didn't already know this. like they could care.
they're just hoping this testimony will not get too much attention. even if it does, as with everything else regarding single-payer, including doctors and nurses being "escorted" from hearings, numerous editorials, demonstrations, and petitions, they will simply ignore it. they have no qualms about openly protecting the insurance industry from the "competition" of a public option.
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peacetalksforall Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 07:49 PM
Response to Original message
28. Have you ever seen a male-female team touch shoulders? Were they using
one microphone? Didn't they each have their one head microphone? Do they do that every morning? Scandalous. I say scandalous.
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Skinner ADMIN Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 07:53 PM
Response to Original message
30. Hearing this makes me wonder why the insurance companies are against a public option.
You'd think they would want a public option so they can dump all their sick customers and have the public option pick them up at taxpayers' expense.
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strategery blunder Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Jun-25-09 01:22 AM
Response to Reply #30
70. They're afraid they can no longer cherry pick.
They're afraid that they have sullied their own reputation so badly that EVERYONE, including the healthy, profitable patients, will dump them for the public option the second it passes. And they are right to fear this.

A strong, viable public option would force them to actually provide the services policyholders pay for, and pretty much force the wholesale dismantling of claims denial departments, if the insurance companies wanted to remain even remotely relevant in healthcare.

They'd love a public option for the sick and uninsurable only, but they're afraid that political pressure from the people will result in a public option open to everyone. Including their healthy customers. Fearmongering galore, straight from greedy @$$hole$ with the MOST to fear. Moreover, their worst fears are their own creation; if health insurance functioned like other forms of insurance that don't make a point of pissing off policyholders at every possible opportunity, these Congressional hearings wouldn't exist.
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peacetalksforall Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 07:53 PM
Response to Original message
31. When Mathews criticized Republicans, she got uptight and started saying : "No, we ....."
Matthews spoke clearly. I never figured out what Joe was talking about related to combining it with medicare and medicaid - I had to assume he meant privatization. He's a pompous juvenile.

OK, are they seeing each other off camera? Do I really care?
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quidam56 Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 07:54 PM
Response to Original message
32. See what is deemed, defended and supported in Tennessee as THE ACCEPTABLE STANDARDS OF HEALTH CARE.
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McCamy Taylor Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 07:54 PM
Response to Original message
33. Good article. Here are some more insurance strategies for reverse cherry picking.
Cherry picking is the practice of signing up only healthy people for insurance. Reverse cherry picking is not legal. Cherry picking is not legal, either, if you are a managed care insurance plan. But health insurers have only one way to boost profits, and that is by collecting the premiums of well people and denying coverage to the sick. Here are some ways that they force sick people off their plans.

1. Retroactively decide the person was uninsurable. Remember how Blue Cross in California instructed doctors to comb the charts of people who got sick to look for "pre-existing conditions"? Like acne? You will not see insurers booting off their healthy members with minor medical problems like that, just the ones who develop cancer.

2. Make it impossible for members who are sick to get necessary care. Have a dozen podiatrists on your plan----and only one dialysis center that happens to be fifty miles away.

3. Have low reimbursements for "sick" care. Pay the podiatrists a lot of money, but short change oncologists who give chemotherapy so that none of them will sign up for your insurance plan. Since many people have a choice of insurers through their jobs, they will select the plan that their oncologists is a member of. This is especially useful for managed care plans and those who sign up large employer groups with a promise to take all comers.

4.Refuse to sell insurance to employers who typically have a lot of employees that use medical services--like women.

5. Sky high deductibles will keep people from using their insurance except in an emergency.
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NYC_SKP Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 07:59 PM
Response to Original message
34. Like everything else in "real life", the rich Congress members know nothing of this.
No do most people among their wealthy friends.

A few may get emails and letters from constituents, but how many care?

These things have been known for years, thank goodness they are getting more attention.

K and R for highlighting them.
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bertman Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 08:07 PM
Response to Original message
36. Cigna "strongly disagree(s) with the suggestion that, motivated by profits, the insurance
industry has deliberately attempted to confuse or unfairly treat covered individuals."

Well, hey, that's all I need to exonerate the insurance industry of any wrongdoing. Case dismissed.

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aquart Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 08:09 PM
Response to Original message
37. My sister can't get long term care insurance because she's too sick.
What with diabetes and being disabled and all. So the rest of her life will be spent in terror of bankrupting her family.

Let me know when that's fixed.
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AlphaCentauri Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 08:10 PM
Response to Original message
39. Good to know that many skeptics will have the opportunity to face the truth
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hunter Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 08:26 PM
Response to Original message
41. The U.S. health insurance industry must die.
Nationalize their assets, trade the stocks of honest shareholders for U.S. treasuries, and deport some of the industry's very worst executives to Guantánamo Bay as enemy combatants. These corporations have killed more U.S. citizens and done more damage to the U.S. economy than any of the 9/11 conspirators now being held indefinitely and unconstitutionally in Cuba.

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npk Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 08:59 PM
Response to Original message
46. Nice that he waits till he is retired w/ pention before he steps up
I am sorry but I have no praise for this sorry sack of shit Wendell Potter. He was just as complicit in his actions as his company. He took advantage of people all the same. It seems to me that he "valued the almighty buck" as much as anyone else at his company. A real whistle blower would have come forward years ago, make that twenty years ago, before millions of families got screwed and others died, needlessly. I'm sorry Mr. Potter while perhaps some people will consider you a hero for what you have done, I do not. I see you as nothing more than an executive who used the system he worked for to make money at others suffering and misfortune and then conveniently decided to have a moment of clarity after you were securely retired and faced no action from your fellow co-workers or company. Well Brav-Fucking-O sir. Yes you are a hero. Not.
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barbtries Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Jun-25-09 01:59 PM
Response to Reply #46
83. he didn't wait until he was retired with a pension
Edited on Thu Jun-25-09 02:00 PM by barbtries
read the link upthread in which he explains himself. if there aren't more people like him, who see the light and actually decide to do something about it, there's no hope for change. he actually is a hero in my book.
here's the link: http://www.pnhp.org/news/2009/june/the_health_care_indu.php
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AllyCat Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Jun-25-09 02:17 PM
Response to Reply #83
84. I agree. I hope more get brave and follow his lead. The people
need to see this to break a few more out of their armchairs in front of the teevee and call their reps!
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BlancheSplanchnik Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 09:08 PM
Response to Original message
47. K,R, Bookmarked. I'm SO glad this was a report to Congress.
Hopefully it will make an impression on those who can do something!
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Wednesdays Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 09:17 PM
Response to Original message
48. K&R
:kick:
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gavinsonseo Donating Member (1 posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 09:24 PM
Response to Reply #48
50. RE
Nice reading.
Thanks.

<a href="http://www.sportsnutritionvlog.com/uk-sports-nutritionist">uk sports nutritionist</a>
<a href="http://www.arkisdata.com/seo-mauritius">Seo Mauritius</a>
<a href="http://www.FourweekFatloss.com">Fat Loss</a>
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Faryn Balyncd Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 10:00 PM
Response to Original message
51. & ONCE DUMPED, these newly un-insurables are charged 250%-600% MORE than insurance companies pay:
Edited on Wed Jun-24-09 10:08 PM by Faryn Balyncd




.....(for the same procedures and services):


maybe 250%: . . . http://www.healthaffairs.org/blog/2007/05/09/hospitals-soak-the-poor-uninsured-hit-with-higher-hospital-bills


or 400%: . . . http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/02/16/eveningnews/main674598.shtml


or sometimes, as in the case of Allan Barnett, when he had outpatient lithotrypsy at Houston's Northwest Hospital, 800%: . . . .http://www.chron.com/CDA/archives/archive.mpl?id=2003_3679711






This is not the American free market at its best, but predatory, robber baron capitalism at its worst.

In former years, progressive Republicans like Theodore Roosevelt put a leash on these cabals, and created our system of regulated capitalism, saving it in the process.

Today, not only Republicans, but large numbers of our own party are committed to protecting and saving, not the American people and productive, competitive free enterprise, but to protecting the insurance cabal and the Medical-Industrial Complex.









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ladywnch Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jun-24-09 10:31 PM
Response to Original message
52. Insurance companies argue that health care reforms that ensure coverage
for those with pre-existing conditions should help tackle the problem of rescissions.

Well if that is true then why do we have to REFORM to get it?......Why not just do it! Why do they have to be told to do it?......unless they really don't give a rat's ass about their policyholders...(no more calls please, we have a winner!)

As a cancer survivor who has put up with this shit for 25 years now I want these bastards to rot in the same fires of hell reserved for the banking and credit card company execs.

But no, we don't need single payer.....the insurance companies are capable of regulating themselves! :puke:
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Name removed Donating Member (0 posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Jun-25-09 12:08 AM
Response to Original message
61. Deleted sub-thread
Sub-thread removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.
 
slipslidingaway Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Jun-25-09 12:10 AM
Response to Original message
62. Testimony from 1996.....
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=5854713&mesg_id=5854713

"...I wish to begin by making a public confession: In the spring of 1987, as a physician, I caused the death of a man.

Although this was known to many people, I have not been taken before any court of law or called to account for this in any professional or public forum. In fact, just the opposite occurred: I was "rewarded" for this. It bought me an improved reputation in my job, and contributed to my advancement afterwards. Not only did I demonstrate I could indeed do what was expected of me, I exemplified the "good" company doctor: I saved a half million dollars!

Since that day, I have lived with this act, and many others, eating into my heart and soul. For me, a physician is a professional charged with the care, or healing, of his or her fellow human beings. The primary ethical norm is: do no harm. I did worse: I caused a death. Instead of using a clumsy, bloody weapon, I used the simplest, cleanest of tools: my words. The man died because I denied him a necessary operation to save his heart. I felt little pain or remorse at the time. The man's faceless distance soothed my conscience. Like a skilled soldier, I was trained for this moment. When any moral qualms arose, I was to remember: I am not denying care; I am only denying payment.

At the time, this helped avoid any sense of responsibility for my decision. Now I am no longer willing to accept this escapist reasoning that allowed me to rationalize this action. I accept my responsibility now for this man's death, as well as for the immeasurable pain and suffering many other decisions of mine caused..."
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alfredo Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Jun-25-09 12:14 AM
Response to Original message
63. Send this to everyone on your mailing list.
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GreenTea Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Jun-25-09 12:16 AM
Response to Original message
64. And the fucking republicans & idiots want to continue to let the insurance corporations run our
Edited on Thu Jun-25-09 12:20 AM by GreenTea
health care system with no government option, no competition is what the insurance companies paid off republicans want, republicans always say fuck the people protect the corporations....the insurance companies have no competition they are in collusion raising prices every six month's...

Like the oil companies, there's a handful of oil companies, you don't have to by gas from one, just can just go across the street and but from another, but the gas is the same price or a penny or so difference everywhere else, that's collusion, monopolies! You either pay what the oil companies demand for gas or your car doesn't run and you walk...

Same with health care corporations you either buy from the big insurance corporations or you have no insurance... You get sick too bad...The big insurance companies have their smaller companies to make it seem like there's more companies out there...but their all price fixing and the CEOs & executives are living like filthy rich kings!

Fuck the insurance companies and their elitist lavish lifestyle.

We want Universal Health Care with a public option Now!
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Dragonfli Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Jun-25-09 01:16 AM
Response to Reply #64
68. It's not just Republicans, the Senate Dems agree with them and
agree that a bi-partisan "insurance first" bill is the only one that should be considered.
They are working hand in hand to fuck us and protect the corporations.

It is these Republicans in Dem clothing that are the biggest problem right now.


I am so glad we all worked so hard to give them the Senate for the purpose of voting against us.(fucking traitors)
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progressoid Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Jun-25-09 01:08 AM
Response to Original message
66. They? THEY??? You, Mr. Potter are "they".
Edited on Thu Jun-25-09 01:10 AM by progressoid
You worked for the insurance industry for over two decades as a PR man. You should be saying "WE", not "THEY". You were part of the problem.


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progressoid Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Jun-25-09 01:12 AM
Response to Original message
67. It's a good thing that the insurance industry got a seat at the table.
Wouldn't want them to think they weren't appreciated.

:eyes:

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greengestalt Donating Member (126 posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Jun-25-09 02:05 AM
Response to Original message
71. Outlaw Insurance companies
Break them up, take all their money, property, the money and property of investors and give it back to the people and doctors it has been stolen from.


Really, if you allow gambling, is it a "Scandal" that the casino make sure the games are overall in it's favor? That if they just "Jackpoted" there'd be quickly no money left to pay the bills...?


Well, Insurance companies have long toted themselves as "Begnin Gambling". A simple (straw man) equation of over a large number of people, how many will get sick, how much it will cost to treat them, then the math for that cost divided among many people with a tiny extra for salaries of the company that manages this.


Except in RL insurance companies get bigger and bigger and bigger. The stock market madness takes over and it becomes a slave to its investors, having to come up with more and more and more profits. Therefore, the service they promised becomes sacrificed. Anyone watch "The Incredibles"? I think an early part of the film summed it up quite nicely...


Outlaw insurance companies... Here's what will happen:

1. The price of health care will go down.
Doctors and hospitals have to pay through the nose for the "Privledge" of even doing business with insurers. Even though they are multiple heads of the same monopolistic hydras, they often will charge a doctor's practice $1000 a month. THEN, they usually cut at least 1/3 what the doctor asks for.
Medical school ain't free. Hospitals ain't free. Therefore, they have to charge more to pay this, even to (in some cases more) non-insured people.


2. Lawsuits will mostly disappear.
Another "Tax" on doctors that is passed on to us is "Malpractice Insurance" which also is part of hospitals budgets. Insurance companies often just pay to save the cost of a trial, and pay big time to save the cost of a prolonged trial. Therefore, they pay more, they charge more. Right now insurers (seperate note) are profiting big time off the Somali pirates by increasing premiums far beyond costs and pirates have to take over ships quick or the crew will scuttle their own ships first "Jolly Roger" they see to collect insurance and get out of work. Most cost is passed on to us, but a single 'botch' can ruin a young doctor's career permanently by making his insurance unaffordable.

With no insurance companies to remove 'responsibility' any sued party will fight bitterly in court. Any long court case will remove the money obtainable, lessening the enthusiasm of any career "Litigant" or "Ambulance Chasing" attorney. It will also give more power to more competent doctors who'll take the time to double-check everything.


Really, if say I had an operation and they messed up and I felt a pain inside. Then I found out they'd lost a scalpel inside me... Well, I'd probably be jumped upon by lawyers and at the same time the hospital wouldn't talk to me on their lawyers advice... And I'd get a lot (minus a LOT of legal fees) in the bitter end... But what I'd want is this: Remove it ASAP, on the house. Compensate (reasonably) any lost work, like "Hey, we goofed, we'll pay the guy's wages and if his absence costs you, we'll pay reasonably..." for a decent but short hospital stay. Then if, say me or a blood relative needs an appendix removed or another minor procedure, that's on the house (and triple check for scalpels!) This proposal is a micro-fraction what it'd cost the hospital/an insurer the "Realistic" outcome, even if they hire "Super lawyer" who manages to "Prove" I operated on myself to insert the scalpel...

Granted, leaving a scalpel inside is a big 'red flag' somethings wrong... However, first Doctors are human too and can make mistakes. The problem, versus other jobs, is that if they forget to "Hold the Mayo" on your bloat burger or a mechanic leaves a monkey wrench inside your car... Well the consequences, legal, human and financial are far more dire. Furthermore, I think that the "Insurance/Lawsuit profiteering" issue helps established bad doctors as much as it is a nightmare hazard for young doctors. The hospitals will side with "Dr. Nick Rivera" because if they admit he's a quack, their premium goes through the roof and the insurer will play along to keep the settlement down. Remove insurance payouts, they'll defend (after vigorously grilling) an honest mistake or something that couldn't be helped, but the quack goes out the door yesterday.


3. No more $100 asprins or $1000 a month drugs.
If no insurance company can pay (2/3) a snuck in "Aprin" fee, they won't charge it to everyone. If no insurance promise can pile on needless doctors but then limit their time helping a patient if they actually find their service is needed, this won't happen. "Intellectual Property" = "Conceptual Art", no way are any of the newest drugs worth what they charge. And if they can't get that, they'll make them for less or a generic will make it anyways.


4. Health insurance plans will strengthen banks.

Banks aren't popular now, but note that the FEDs for all their failings will honor that $100,000 FDIC thing if they got to start the presses at the mint that very day. Now watching Michael Moore's "Sicko", having my mom work for lawyers in the 80s and also having an "Insurance Denied" thing affect my family, I say this; "The real tragedy of these insurance things is that if the money spent on insurance had been put in a bank account, very few of the patients would have had any trouble paying their doctors".

Have people who want insurance put money aside in the banks and/or have their employers do so also. It's a savings account that (once we RAISE interest rates!) will grow and be protected. The banks will then have a 'solid' base to stand on in what will soon be a much more controlled economy. And these 'savings' aren't profits to give to investors. These savings are the personal property of people and/or businesses that employ them, so when someone dies it can go in an inheritance or be kept for other employees.

-Anyone without insurance who needs catastrophic care should be "Given" a loan, but that amounts to a mild 'fine' that taxes (mildly) their wages.
-Illegals are a non-issue. We don't need no stinkin fence. Check the books on low-wage employers, enforce laws. They'll go home with no lousy jobs that make them targets of hatred. But anyone stumbling into a hospital bleeding deserves to be patched up by the "Hippocratic Oath" to help mankind.
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Dragonfli Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Jun-25-09 02:30 AM
Response to Reply #71
72. That sounds just and fair. Other Protection Rackets are illegal.
These mobsters should be facing RICO charges right now IMO.
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Happy Vic Donating Member (18 posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Jun-27-09 01:29 PM
Response to Reply #71
95. You put it better but I agree
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tclambert Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Jun-25-09 06:26 AM
Response to Original message
75. Makes perfect sense. If your prime motive is profit, then helping people stay healthy
cannot be anything more than secondary.

Question: Does this apply to the not for profit Blue Cross/Blue Shield organizations? They have removed the profit motive, however they do compete with the profit making insurance companies. Can they keep their premiums down enough to successfully compete if they insure really sick people?
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Kat45 Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Jun-25-09 04:14 PM
Response to Reply #75
85. Blue Cross is nonprofit in name only.
IIRC, its CEO makes a huge salary. And from my own experience going back many, many years, BCBS works very hard at denying coverage. I've never been able to figure out how "nonprofit" applies to that company. If they're not as bad as the for-profit insurers, they're pretty close.
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Psychic Consortium Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Jun-25-09 08:09 AM
Response to Original message
76. They are no different than the corrupt greedy banking industry. nt
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fascisthunter Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Jun-25-09 08:42 AM
Response to Original message
77. The Insurance Companies SHould be RICO'ed
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olegramps Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Jun-25-09 08:50 AM
Response to Original message
78. Who do you the Senators and Representitives are going to listen to?
They shrug their shoulders, talk about reform and quietly accept tens of thousands of dollars in campaign contributions from their buddies running these crooked companies.

I believe that President Obama may very well see his base erode if he continues to push his plan of buckling down to the demands of the insurance giants. This is a major issue that is not going to disappear like so many representatives hope will happen as it has done in the past. The American people can no longer be deceived that our health care is the best in the world when the facts clearly demonstrate that it is a total failure both in providing care and cost.

Any person in their right mind only has to look at the compensation of those running these rip-off companies to understand why they would oppose a single-payer plan. Their compensation is in the tens of millions of dollars a YEAR with perks that are totally unconscionable. Indeed we have the best government that the wealthy can afford.
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marshall Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Jun-25-09 10:06 AM
Response to Original message
79. Financial triage?
It's like an episode of MASH set in our times.
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Keno76 Donating Member (32 posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Jun-25-09 12:55 PM
Response to Original message
81. Greedy bastages
They need to just go away
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asthmaticeog Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Jun-25-09 01:00 PM
Response to Original message
82. How big of him to step up after he took his golden parachute. Pigfucking lowlife.
He spent his life pocketing manslaughter money and we're supposed to praise him for saying something NOW? I hope he gets brain cancer and his insurance drops him.
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superconnected Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Jun-25-09 07:16 PM
Response to Reply #82
91. It's not nice to wish cancer on anyone.
I'm glad he finally spoke up.
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asthmaticeog Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Jun-26-09 01:19 AM
Response to Reply #91
93. A) I'm not nice. B) I've had cancer.
Edited on Fri Jun-26-09 01:19 AM by asthmaticeog
I, however, never pocketed the profits from letting countless random strangers die. I'd say he deserves worse than what I went through, easily. You're free to disagree, of course, but be advised that you're wrong.
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hunter Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jun-29-09 09:57 AM
Response to Reply #91
105. Well, we have a prison in Cuba... how about that?
It seems just the right place to keep health insurance company executives. They've killed more people and done more damage to the U.S. economy than any of the September 11 conspirators.
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Kurovski Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Jun-25-09 04:59 PM
Response to Original message
86. K&R. (nt)
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Fridays Child Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Jun-26-09 09:07 PM
Response to Original message
94. ...
:kick:
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JimWis Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Jun-27-09 02:43 PM
Response to Original message
96. I read the actual testimony of Potter. It is damn near criminal what
the insurance companies are doing. What bugs me is that a committee in congress can sit and listen to that, then not do a damn thing about it. Pretty obvious they work for money, not the common people. Course I guess we already knew that.
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syberlion Donating Member (110 posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Jun-28-09 07:27 PM
Response to Reply #96
100. If the insurance companies stay, then make laws where
the CEO and the Board of Directors are directly liable for any deaths caused by putting profits over patient care. As long as the executives have no dog in the hunt, they could care less about less care. Start increasing their chances of sitting in a jail cell for the rest of their lives and you'll see change, quick. The fact these people aren't regularly brought up on negligent homicide boggles my mind.

Maybe if they woke up and the tombstones of the hundreds of people they directly killed through their mis-management appeared on their front lawn - no, that wouldn't work, because they would look at that as a positive up-tick as that many fewer people their company is having to payout benefits, yea profits!!!

You want to end the influence peddling? Publicly Financed elections. Eliminate the need for congress and senate races having to spend hundreds of thousands of millions of dollars to run an election. The candidates have to get that money from somewhere and there is a price on that money, a BIG price. As long as elections are financed in the private sector, you are going to get these results.

If you believe it is time, then take about 10 minutes out of your day and make 3 phone calls; to your one congressional representative and your two senators. Be nice, be polite because you're talking to a staffer that is tallying everything and taking that information to the representative. Just let them know you support single payer or a very strong governmental option.

Now, for those in districts where "my representative is a douche-bag republican..." (I should know, I have Kay Bailout Hutchinson and John Cornhole) If they get flooded with phone calls and emails and postcards, then they HAVE TO consider supporting because they can count and they want to stay in office. This is a BIG deal and it is having an effect because several reps that were either on the fence or opposed have flipped.

800-426-8073 is the toll free number to call. It will be the best 10 minutes you will spend and the end result could help yourself and the rest of the country. It is that easy. Don't know who represents you? Go to congress.org and find "My Elected Officials" enter your zip code and there you go! It is simple, it is easy and it will make a difference.
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JimWis Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Jun-28-09 08:05 PM
Response to Reply #100
101. I am lucky. Both of my Senators and Representative are in favor
of a public health option. I have also emailed, called, signed petitions. We just have to keep at it. I agree on the campaign reform also.
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sarcasmo Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Jun-27-09 10:09 PM
Response to Original message
97. Reform, NOW!
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No Elephants Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jun-29-09 06:17 AM
Response to Original message
102. Wall Street-Ripping off taxpayers AND killing them. Best argument for single payor.
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sarcasmo Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jun-29-09 09:33 PM
Response to Original message
106. Kick back to the top.
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