Only 38% think Obamacare is too liberal.

[Cruella]

Your doc needs better billing software.

LOL....she's only one out of thousands.

According to this article from 2009, about a third won't take them.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/02/business/retirementspecial/02health.html?_r=0

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/health/jan-june13/medicare_03-04.html

 

[Lagboltz]

Medicare and medicaid are perfect examples of half socialist and half market programs with the government pulling the strings through regulations and caps. Then they add more regulations on top of more regulations causing products and services to be less efficient, less innovative, less available and more expensive in the long run through all the bureaucratic hurdles.

You talk about Medicare being great. Well my doctor won't take medicare patients. The reimbursement for a level 2 office visit paid to the doctor is about $40.

Years ago, when working in cost accounting, we figured out it cost the company approximately $50 to process and administer the paperwork just for the invoicing. Not including all the other departments and hands required to fill orders.

I've heard doctors say that they don't make any money on medicare patients and have to make it up in other areas, which practically forces health care providers to be less than honest in oder to stay in business It's no surprise to me why insurance and medical costs are so high. The more government regulations and bureacatic red tape you throw in to gum up the works, the more it's going to cost everyone in the long run. And who gets called the bad guy and who's butt is on the line for bad government? The doctors and the free market.

I suppose if you define socialism as government regulations you can say that, but there are government regulations on practically every industry. That would make the agriculture, automotive, and oil industries half socialistic.

Isolated doctors may have trouble with medicare, but doctor consortiums, especially those connected with a hospital welcome Medicare. A very large part of the high costs of hospital care is also due to greedy tactics. It is all spelled out in the Time Magazine article I referenced a while ago.

 

[Cruella]

I suppose if you define socialism as government regulations you can say that, but there are government regulations on practically every industry. That would make the agriculture, automotive, and oil industries half socialistic.

Isolated doctors may have trouble with medicare, but doctor consortiums, especially those connected with a hospital welcome Medicare. A very large part of the high costs of hospital care is also due to greedy tactics. It is all spelled out in the Time Magazine article I referenced a while ago.

I won't argue your points here. It's frustrating for me, who has spent years up to my eyeballs in the minutia of cost analysis to show you where your led astray. It's not just a minority of doctors either. Hospitals by law can't turn patients away. They make up for it in other areas like we've already discussed.

 

[Lagboltz]

I won't argue your points here. It's frustrating for me, who has spent years up to my eyeballs in the minutia of cost analysis to show you where your led astray. It's not just a minority of doctors either. Hospitals by law can't turn patients away. They make up for it in other areas like we've already discussed.

There is no argument. I agree with you on the overwhelming paperwork and other associated costs. But the chargemaster fees that hospitals use has little relation to any sort of detailed cost analysis, and they refuse to discuss it.

When hospitals complain about non-paying patients, they elevate their loss by using the chargemaster fees, and not the fees negotiated by insurance companies, which are still quite profitable, yet up to ten times lower. Hospital cost accounting is amazingly unfair. It's all in the Time magazine article.