Your retirement plans . . .

[sevenhelmet]

Yes but those non-risky ones generally pay a very small amount on an individual scale.

My auto insurance is $500 / year. If I get into an accident, it will cost my insurance company at least $30k.

If we apply this model to a healthy 20-something year old whose only risk is acute injury, insurance premiums shouldn't be $4,000 with high deductibles. It's only that way because the ACA created rules that insurance companies are limited on what they can charge a 50 year old smoker / alcoholic with a BMI of 42 that needs to pop a cocktail of cholesterol and blood pressure medicine so he doesn't die of a dyspnea induced heart attack, and anytime anyone wants to change this bullshit it turns into "waaa, they want to take away your health care!"

From what I can see the fundamental problem is a healthcare system that is so full of bloat, overhead, middlemen, and markups that services end up costing far more than they could. Heath care is the ONLY industry I have encountered where I can't even get a quote on what a treatment will cost before ordering it! What's worse is when it comes time to pay for my part of that procedure, I get a bill from a third party that doesn't have any obvious affiliation with the hospital or the insurance company. It's shady as fuck.

Don't even get me started on doctors tactically ordering unnecessary procedures to make more money, leading to increased human suffering (because this system values prolonging life over quality of life)...

I would love to see all of that addressed. However, it's readily apparent our politicians don't have the foggiest notion of how to fix it, either.

 

[Spekkio]

Heath care is the ONLY industry I have encountered where I can't even get a quote on what a treatment will cost before ordering it! What's worse is when it comes time to pay for my part of that procedure, I get a bill from a third party that doesn't have any obvious affiliation with the hospital or the insurance company. It's shady as fuck.

To the first part - it's actually against federal law for healthcare providers to advertise prices. It was a libertarian talking point around the Obamacare debate that you could solve a lot by inserting actual price competition into the healthcare market through a sticker law akin to going to the mechanic. The lack of price transparency is what makes people so afraid that they'll receive a $5,000 bill for visiting the UC clinic and getting an an antibiotic (it will actually be like $300 total), and insurance makes it really easy to ignore your statement of benefits and just pay the bottom-line of the bill.

To the second part - yes, fuck QuesTec labs and the shady contracts they have. I don't know why they get to bill for a service that an UC clinic performs in-house with their own equipment, and they charge double the prices that the clinic does for running the tests. At least in this case, thankfully Tricare tells them to f-off and pays them like $30 out of the $250 they billed.

I would love to see all of that addressed. However, it's readily apparent our politicians don't have the foggiest notion of how to fix it, either.

I think plenty do, but there just isn't the political will to get it done. The public tends to get outraged really fast anytime anyone mentions cutting mandatory insurance benefits and this is an issue that will have to get worse before it can get better.

 

[sevenhelmet]

To the first part - it's actually against federal law for healthcare providers to advertise prices.

There's advertising, and then there's refusing to commit to a ballpark number when sitting down with the hospital admin staff to discuss signing paperwork to commit to a non-elective procedure. How in the fucking hell am I supposed to run my family budget when I have no Earthly clue what it will cost? Do I just assume everything will take me to the out-of-pocket maximum? I ended up Googling the procedure, because the admin was next to worthless. This was four years ago, and I'm still disgusted by how shady it all was.

I contend the lack of transparency in medical costs is also driving a lot of grift and price gouging in the system.

 

[Angry]

I’ve found that if you make a big enough scene in the waiting room, getting progressively louder as the receptionist/office manager refuses to give you a number, they will eventually relent.

Yes, it was at a pediatric sick appointment so maybe that helped, but borderline yelling “what do you mean you can’t tell me the cost of this visit?!” was getting enough attention from other parents they finally came clean. I do think that most of the clerks in physician offices don’t know (because they don’t care to) and they are just submitting the billing to insurance and saying fuck it, patient’s problem. But enough concierge medicine options and health systems that DO advertise prices (Flagler in NE FL) are popping up that at least you can vote with your feet and use them if you want to make a point of it.

 

[MIDNJAC]

I think a start would be a system where folks aren't financially ruined, even with health insurance, at the whims of a shady industry that values profit over all (and schemes to make just that). It's a lot more complicated than that, but the reality of a person staring down a $50k bill for a basic procedure is absurd. Nothing about any of it cost $50k, other than maybe the provider's own insurance policy. Docs/nurses/healthcare professionals aren't paid *that* much. If it is life saving surgery, I get it. But that's also generally covered in a large part.

 

[exNavyOffRec]

I’ve found that if you make a big enough scene in the waiting room, getting progressively louder as the receptionist/office manager refuses to give you a number, they will eventually relent.

Yes, it was at a pediatric sick appointment so maybe that helped, but borderline yelling “what do you mean you can’t tell me the cost of this visit?!” was getting enough attention from other parents they finally came clean. I do think that most of the clerks in physician offices don’t know (because they don’t care to) and they are just submitting the billing to insurance and saying fuck it, patient’s problem. But enough concierge medicine options and health systems that DO advertise prices (Flagler in NE FL) are popping up that at least you can vote with your feet and use them if you want to make a point of it.

As a dad who has had to rush into the ER years ago with my daughter with a serious injury I 100% understand getting upset when it comes to our kids, one of the hardest things is seeing your kid in pain. I did get to see first hand that the ER near me doesn't play around with people getting loud and upset. When I was waiting to get taken back to a bed a guy start getting loud/upset, within 60 seconds security arrived and the instructions were clear, either lower your voice or be removed from the property by law enforcement. This ER has really low wait times too, unless they have a trauma case you don't wait long.