You're viewing a single thread.
To be fair, I've had doctors pad the bill. I'm lucky enough to have decent insurance and I have a few stories about doctors taking advantage of that.
So what?
So it's a good argument for single payer healthcare
so does that make it ok for healthcare providers to deny coverage for procedures or medication that has been prescribed due to an illness or ailment impacting a patients quality of life?
No it doesn't but I can understand why they don't greenlight everything. This all is a glaring example why we need single payer health care and doctors that earn a flat rate and not get paid per procedure (there is a name for this, i don't know it).
It's self fulfilling though. Doctors offices are at the whims of their agreements with the insurance companies to stay afloat. They pad the bill (charging maximum for everything) because the insurance company will only pay percentages on most procedures. Then they usually write off the rest (or close to it). Doctors are incentivized to prescribe certain drugs over others, and other such meddling.
Healthcare costs are as high as they are specifically because of private insurance. The evidence is in every single other developed country that has state-provided healthcare. It's overall cheaper, and often better.
Insurance companies default to denying claims because they know, if the barrier is high enough (denial after denial), people will simply stop asking for the procedure (or whatever), so they don't have to pay anything. Then their earnings go up, and they pad their pockets.
To say "insurance company bad" oversimplifies the problem. That's why it's foolish to base opinions on memes. Where there's lots of money, greedy people will find a way to get at it or as I like to say "shit attracts flies". In my work I deal with private companies that are paid with public dollars. What I see going on has jaded me hardcore. Publicly funding the health care system will be a disaster without overhauling the whole system.
I don't disagree with you. We can't simply replace insurance companies with a public version and expect everything to be okay. But Medicare and Medicaid seem to work really well for a lot of people. They can simply expand it, and then private insurance can still exist as a supplement if someone wants.
But what we really need is more regulation, everywhere, on almost all industries.
Gotta kill citizens United, and make superpacs illegal. When money gets out of politics, is when we'll finally see some change.
Any examples?
A few. I had a primary care doctor who would talk my ear off. After we discussed whatever my problem was he would talk about religion and politics. He was pretty right wing, me having a catholic school education and have long paid attention to politics can hold my own. The odd thing, there was always a waiting room full of patients but he would gab on and on. Eventually I came in for an appointment and I said to his receptionist "the doctor sure doesn't rush me out of there". That's when she said "yeah most insurance companies want you out in fifteen minutes". At that moment it clicked. The doctor was always looking at his watch, if he went over fifteen minutes he could charge for another fifteen minutes. He also had a waiting room full of posters and pamphlets paid for by pharmaceutical companies. He suggested prescribing me medication for my anxiety, i just laughed. My doctor now has none of that propaganda in his waiting room. My last visit he pushed eating fresh fruit and vegetables. I told him that's why I come to him, he tells me what I don't want to hear. I had a dentist who was the same way. Also very religious and right wing.