[DeTomaso] observations about the high cost of health care

[Lynn Wall]

As a former healthcare consultant with a specialty in government
reimbursement and compliance I could not agree more.  Here is my story.

I am at home waiting for a repairman to arrive when I get a call telling me
that my 11 year old son just wiped out snowboarding and was presently
strapped to a back board and needed to be "rushed" to the hospital and they
needed me to ride with him.  I asked how it happened and this was what they
told me.  "he was boarding down the hill when he wiped out.  He got up and
boarded the rest of the way down the hill never issuing a complaint.  They
stopped for lunch and he complained of a sore neck.  A paramedic was walking
by, asked him what happened, he told them, next thing he knows is they are
strapping him down to the board."  I tell the person on the phone to un
strap him and let him get on his way (I'm a firm believer in rubbing dirt on
it and walking it off).  They said they could not since he was already
"under treatment".  I told them they better figure another way out because I
was 35 miles away.  They said we was not crying and I said it was because he
was not hurt, they even asked him and he said he was not hurt.  Long story
short, wife shows up sees her cute little boy strapped to a board crying
now.  1 hour ambulance drive to the emergency room, 3 hours now on the back
board they start a long series of x-rays and MRI.  5 hours on the back board
they finally decide he is okay but they were going to send him home in a
neck brace.  I was fuming mad and said no.  "Why not?????" they asked.  I
said that they brace would be about $700 and NOTHING WAS WRONG!!!!!!!.  I
told my kid to move and turn his head...he did....no pain and $3,500 later
they believed me.  This seemed like the ambulance chasers were.....well....
the ambulance drivers and the hospital.

Later I found out that the ski resort has a terrain park that is locally
referred to as the "trauma park".  There are so many injuries there that the
paramedics are permanently stationed there during the ski season.  I have
since stopped blaming the ambulance drivers considering the volume of
injuries they see.  But the hospital was running every test (like the good
doctor mentioned below) regardless of the results of the prior test.  Each
test I protested vehemently.  In the end I had to physically remove my child
from the hospital. 

I firmly believe that number 2 below is the chief driver of healthcare
costs.  The doctors are just protecting themselves but a couple of things
are still true: Kids fall, good people die and our taxes will SKYROCKET and
the quality of care will PLUMMET under any of the governmental plans being
offered.  Just check Massachusetts and the latest lawsuit filed by a
hospital against the state because hospitals and providers become the
clearing house for funding deficits.  

Lynn



-----Original Message-----
From: detomaso-bounces at realbig.com [mailto:detomaso-bounces at realbig.com] On
Behalf Of Justin Greisberg
Sent: Monday, July 20, 2009 4:43 AM
To: detomaso at realbig.com
Subject: [DeTomaso] observations about the high cost of health care


I am horribly intertwined in the current health care system.  High costs
come about from a bunch of things, all sharing the load:

1. the best care in the world (with lots of technology)

2. ridiculous legal environment - if anything in our world goes wrong,
everyone except the individual must be to blame.  Doctors are taught (by
recurrent malpractice claims) that they must order lots of tests, because if
the one in a million diagnosis is missed, they will be blamed.

3. patients request (and doctors order) far too many tests.  for example,
MRIs for routine shoulder and knee pain do not affect treatment, but they
are done routinely.

4. the burden of the uninsured.  i especially am concerned with illegal
residents, since they suck blood out of the system without giving anything
back (no taxes, medicare payments, etc)

5. increasingly complex paperwork for insurers and governments.  definitely
require more employees to do the same work as the old days.

 

Health care is expensive, and maybe it is OK that it is a large part of our
GNP.  There is a reason why international dignitaries and celebrities all
come here when they need something.  when is the last time one of our
celebrities went to another country for surgery?  

 

If we dont address the above items, we will not control healthcare.  Yet,
most politicians, especially the democrats, refuse to address the defective
legal system.  To provide insurance through the government for more citizens
is great, but there is no idea how to pay for that.  And if the government
plans to "control" healthcare, as some have proposed, then we will take the
best system in the world and cripple it.  The solution has to keep the free
market system alive, since that is the best in the world.  Obama is trying
to ram health care reform down our throats, yet there really is no good idea
what to actually do.  I like the idea of patients paying a fixed percentage
of everything that gets done - that way they have a "Stake" in keeping costs
down.  with most insurance plans, the patient has no idea how much money s
being spent.  The current government-sponsored insurance (medicaid) simply
rewards bad behaviors, like welfare.  I'll get off my soapbox now (but
someone did ask).  Justin Greisberg, MD

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