HEALTH CARE IN AMERICA
After a trip north for a great event and a few days in Washington DC May 2011, I was inspired to write the following-
AMMEDMENT- JULY 2011
The news from the studio is interesting and alarming today. The records I posted earlier about health care cost were underestimated for health insurance premiums.
The correct estamate for health care premium for the average individual in east tennessee is $300.00 per month. This amount of money can increase for families to $1200.00 per month. Sometimes the employer pays about $500.00 per month for an employee with a family. Some health insurance companies are charging upto an additional $2000.00 deductible per yer that is out of pocket for the individual employee. That is- the employee is required by the insurance company to pay the premium and all the medical bills for the year up to $2000.00 and an additional copay is tacked on at the doctors office. Making the cost of a cold much more than the $10.00 per year I paid. It brings the average of the insured individual paying $4090.00 per year for just a cold. That is the low figure. and doesn’t factor in the cost of a family who gets the cold and passes it around the home. That closely estimated figure is $$$10,400.00 for cold season paid to the health care industry from the insured individual and that is not including the premium paid by the employer which amounts to a whopping $6000.00 more. Were not to the cost of medication yet for your cold. So, a family who is paying for insurance and is supplemented by employer insurance pay -one cold a year for the family is racking up a magnitude of $16,400.00 to the health care industry. and well- with my amendment, my final comment is: does anyone know how to read a health insurance statement or medical bill- and why do we need people to go to school to learn how to code medical procedures and doctors visits. I was there for a cold. My insurance is paid. I did not have any other complaints or procedures that I’m aware of. What do you think? You have the flu, and well the doctor should ask you if you’d like a throat culture to see if it’s strep- and then give you a script for an antibiotic as a precautions? anything more? Drink plenty of fluids and take a vitamin c two times a few Tylenol if you have a fever. Call us right away if the symptoms of fever persist. a little Vick’s helps too! anything else?
Yellow Essay 21 is not a medical school for doctors or ethics -we do have a license to drive, and we know highway robbery when we see it and smelly conduct.
POSTED in JUNE Before the Amendment -READ BELOW
Today I rant from the studio: Though a very good friend of mine said: live, love and talk - so here it is…
Let’s not talk about the state of Washington DC. Let us first talk about the state of health care. When I was a child growing up, we had doctors who were in independent practice. I went to the doctor for immunization shots,… mumps, measles,… a broken arm, and once more for a fall I took outside on ice in the middle of winter.
So, in a 21 year period, I saw a doctor, about six times.
My mother paid the doctor a reasonable sum of money and that was that.
Today, because the liability insurance for doctors is very costly, it has driven doctors into group practices. This trend for group medical practice gave way in the 80’s and grew to dominate the entire United States medical system, and also gave way to associative thinking on the part of doctors. Rather than true and sustaining determinations within some medical practices.
But we’ll save the pitfalls of associative thinking for another day.
Other major trends in health-care from the 80’s was the implementation of health insurance for the mass majority and the incredible and obscene cost of hospitalization and hospital procedures. Those costs carry over into spent tax dollars and I’ll expand on this segment in a minute. In addition we began to see, boutique drugs from Pharmaceutical companies. Though what many of you might not know is that the very expensive cost of those boutique drugs, and the wide spread sales of those drugs through samplings at doctors offices as a preliminary means of getting the word out about the drug, and sometimes of dangerous drugs I might add, made by the pharmaceutical companies -paid for drug companies to get pretty fat. And then care so much about the people that they serve by discontinuing the research and making of many drugs that could actually help in all areas of health, and instead, used target markets of making only the drugs in the area that made the most money. Has anyone seen the acid reflux commercial ?
Instead of doctors telling us that you should not drink to much liquid with you meals, as it causes acid reflux and dilutes the natural stomach acid needed for digestion and the result of drinking too many liquids at meal time often causes acid to reflux into the esophagus. More health tips later. -The drug company representatives train American doctors to use their pills, and charge it to your already exorbitant insurance company premium, or better yet, the federal insurance paid by everyone’s taxes.
Once more, the money derived from the sales of these drugs was more than enough to pay for elaborate lunches for doctors and staff members of the group as the pharmaceutical employees then, not only paid for the lunches of their listeners, they called their sales pitch: education. With trinkets like pens and flash drives, note pads, and maybe -in some cases much more. Other hidden information from many patients was that the drug companies then became publishers of medical manuals for doctors. In other words -the people with the most vested interest to make ungodly amounts of money which have been affording to pay that extra fee for the many many lunches of entire staffs of doctors with trinkets to add, for more than twenty-five years now -we’re, and still are, writing the directions for doctors in actual medical manuals. Hense, the Merck Manual.
The manuals for medicine in many circumstances have been written by people who make excessive amounts of money in doing so, and those researchers do not work independently of the companies making the drugs, which the manual recommends that doctors use.
These researchers are the drug makers with a major vested interest in serving the drug companies needs and goals. The name of the game is -in other words: buy our drugs as the manual says so. And let’s not forget how much money can be made in the stock market to those who know ahead of time that a drug is being released into the market place. Just look up the early market numbers on the drug VIAGRA.
And I guess, a researcher would know if a drug is going to be released into the market and could easily make plenty of money in investments, as the dollars (essentially paid for from your tax dollars and your insurance premiums)behind the marketing are bigger than big.
It is not that I am against taking an aspirin when I need one, though, my greatest concern is that within the medical practices in relationship to manuals being written by drug companies and education of doctors by drug companies, there is a lack of meaning about good doctoring. And, now that I’ve said that, I have a bit more information to fill you in on. I have some doctor friends, at YALE, and this is what they told me: Doctors days consist of a long series of 15 minute appointment time slots mostly. The management of the medical groups has set these time slots up for doctors, though many good doctors, take, at times, more time, with patients leaving the doctors in the office overtime. The staff of doctors also goes into overtime to complete visits with each patient and is costly. In the old days- a doctors office was maybe two people - a doctor, and a nurse maybe. Sometimes just a doctor who owned their own home and had a small office within the house was common. With the big groups and very large staff, that overtime amounts to a much greater amount of money and is either carried over to the patient or better yet, the insurance company, which is some how paid for out of patients pockets with higher premium costs rapidly expanding as well as federal tax dollars also paying the price. Again, it’s money out of our budgets either way you look at it. Driving the price for insurance up for everyone involved including the federal government, which again, all comes from your tax dollars.
Let’s see, so, doctors have 15 minute time slots. The problem isn’t as much with the time slots as it is with the pharmaceutical companies writing actual medical manuals. Prior to 1980, doctors certainly were not perfect in there assumptions of medical practise, but they learned to have a greater understanding of ailments and also a better understanding of the spirit of a patient. [see the movie Bells of St. Mary’s] Not exactly perfect yet, and a very Demanding job then, but, I think, from what I’ve heard from my old doctor friends, the work was more human then and more rewarding as a whole. Today’s doctors, because of the structure which is predetermined for them in their scheduling, and testing, and protocol, is not as fulfilling to even the doctor in some cases, and frankly I always feel a great deal better when I visit a good hair stylist than a doctors office these days. But we’ll save that article for another day. And to continue, there is always a great contextual element involved when you have time to learn and deduct informative information of the focused subject that is, rather than more often using current trend driven protocol as a means for care.
So, what do we have so far? We have expensive insurance and drug representatives directing our measure for care of patients rather than doctors.
We have under-trained staff members that have access to our medical knowledge and our routine treatments. We have drug companies providing slanted, or less than complete choices for medical treatments, or what I mean to say: less than complete sets of information to doctors, which is carried over to patient choices. We have insurance companies making obscene amounts of money with added co-pays from patients, which tacks on big dollar profits for the recipient of that co-payment who ever that is? We don’t know the answer to this? The question being- who is making money from the service and how much are we actually paying for that service? It’s not that I don’t wish to pay a doctor or seek medical care. In the old days it was simple: you need a service, the doctor provided that service, and you knew how much you paid the doctor for that service.
See, very simple.
Though, when I have a cold- my first stop is to the health food store to buy eucalyptus oil, lemons, honey, and herbal tea. All that costs, about, say, $10.00.
I might get a cold once a year, thoughmy usual patterns of getting colds are once every four years or so, with the exception of the last three years. And anyway, that $10.00 fee is a one time annual fee I pay to take care of my cold rather than the monthly insurance premium of around $100.00 plus the $35.00 co-payment for the doctors visit. And well, with one year of insurance premiums and one visit to the doctor a year, today’s cost is $1235.00 for that cold, verses $10.00 that I paid at the health food store after I researched my own symptoms. And I still have a jar of honey and a bottle of eucalyptus oil for several more years left in the pantry. To my recollection, I paid out of pocket to go to the doctors a few years ago and the cost was $50.00. It was to get a prescription of allegra that I already knew I needed. Okay, the point, or at least one of the points is- for the whole year that year, I spent $70.00 for my health care needs from a doctor. So, it was a little bit more than $10.00 that year. My issue here is that the high cost of the premium, and then, the cost of a co-pay as well, is way over the cost that is affordable. Who is making the money paid out? And how much should going to a doctor cost?
Let’s get into federal health insurance for a minute. Insurance companies and medical groups are pushing the concepts of preventive medicine practices. For each procedure which is pushed as preventive procedure that a patient goes through, there is a weighted fee involved, and with that fee, someone some where is making money. The term preventative, actually means to educate.
It is not simple, but in a way it is. Example: if you use plenty of salt or eat too many salty foods, you might have high blood pressure and with that, you may be at risk for strokes. So what should we educate you on? Think about it, you know the answer. If you smoke, you could get cancer: so what should we test you for? Or -to educate the patient of healthy practices which are natural methods and can be built into your lifestyle, and is not a procedure, and I might add, is not costly. As follows: to reduce blood pressure higher activity helps and less salty and fatty foods: more walking, stretching, biking, and exercise. Prevention lists are very long. The list is extensive.
To be ordered by a doctor to go through a preventive care program is not legal, as is to be ordered to stop smoking. A doctor can tell you that smoking will shorten you life and you should stop. But they can not demand that you stop. Doctors can not require a patient to follow these recommendations, nor can doctors offices share your information with other related parties to present these concepts of life style changes to you without first, asking you, and gaining your written official permission under the federal privacy act, otherwise they would be in grave violation of federal laws and could be sued as well as perhaps, dismantled as an organization. And if a medical group or insurance company really had your health at the forefront of preventive care, the can cheaply and very easily create a web-site listing healthy ways to prevent common ailments as is found in old American cook books and some early medical books as well as advise from homeopathic doctors as to ways to treat a single ailment, providing you with all the choices which the ” practice’ of doctors are indoctrinated into the medical society to do.
The word doctor does not actually mean schooled, it means to have all encompassing knowledge of a specified area. That means: whole or complete knowledge. And it does not necessarily mean a schooled degree. Although, we think that doctors have all encompassing knowledge with their degree and the legal license to “practice” which they obtain.
Getting back to federal medical insurance. Why do I care? Well, should you care where dollars are going when it pertains to all American citizens. To have access to medical insurance and good doctors who treat each patient well, means that we have an American population which is healthier. We all want that don’t we.
Tax dollars - there is outrageous overspending which is draining the dollars which could be spent to make sure everyone in America has access to good medical care when needed. Expensive trends in American health care have driven up the price of health care in every sector of America and within that inflated cost, the tax dollar is greatly effected. And the inflation has kicked people out of coverage needed until they end up needing extremely expensive critical care, spending multiples of dollar amounts than would have been spent in simple coverage for all. We all want a healthy America everywhere with everyone, it’s part of the American dream!
Back to preventive medicine and procedures. Those extra procedures are not education, they are costly tests. Sometimes, I admit, the test are needed. If you have a pain in your head and swelling is causing it, certainly a brain scan would be reasonable. Though when an insurance company independently calls all of their patients to recommend they have a mammogram rather that your doctor, something is not quite right. And the cost for those test are expensive and multiplied by the number of patients receiving the call and the number of test which are recommended I might add. Expanding to big dollars.
It is the responsibility of a doctor to provide us with the broadest possible solutions in health-care, and then wait for patients to actually make their own decisions as to whether the medical recommendations are what we as individuals desire. So, the concept, preventive or / education, is what we actually see doctors for in the first place, and not to be under the scrutiny of having to take a doctors advise if we believe it is not in our best interest. I think that the freedom of choice are provisions actually outlined in the United States Constitution under -something about freedom of choice, and belief. Even in the case that you’re careless about say eating too much steak and salty foods, or even more radical practices within your life.
And well, where was I? Costly Insurance Premiums? Equal health care? Education by doctors, and pervention sites? Could it cut the cost of insurance, if we had such online services as prevention sites, perhaps provided by an independent source rather than the actual medical group or pharmaceutical groups to keep us from bias opinions. Would it cut the cost of medical insurance at federal levels if the federal government provided us with a comprehensive site on health-care with a panel from many professionals including homeopaths, and even eastern doctors, as well as newer aesthetic remedies, and other professional advise, as well as excellent food specialist, and then made general medications for average complaints available over the counter at capped prices as well as capping the price of all medications to assist in bringing down the cost of living for all of our citizens. Capping costs would promote more use of a beneficial drug and create more sales of the drug, and benefit average maintenance of everyones health overall. Which has a potential to aid in preventing chronic health issues through empowering more people to access early treatment to general health issues. Other ways to save cost for tax dollars in health care is to cap health care providers who over tax the health care system. Why aren’t there caps on Insurance companies premuims now?
Anyway… There are some doctors that are moving back to private practice after over twenty years and are teaming with medical group networks to provide internal insurance for patients for general and major procedures including needed hospitalizations. The medical group networks are ever changing in their means for financial support. One group that I know of, has a grant writing staff to secure grants for individuals who would not be able to pay the needed medical treatment bill. I’ve heard that there are medical group networks who are looking at employing sustainable businesses to supplement overrun cost for needed coverage to ensure doctor and staff payment as well as to remove the 15 minute time constraints which most American doctors work within today. The blip affect is what I like to call it. Removing the blip affect provides doctors with needed down time to actually implement more research for patients care leading to a giant leap in quality care. The improved quality office life for doctors and staff, as well as improved quality care, all leads to less taxes in these new network groups for the independent practitioner.
The implementation of quality care measures leads to better overall health of patients long term.
So, we’ve improved the quality of life for doctors, and staff, and lead to better care.
We’ve even cut tax dollars. Though there is the issue of privacy of patients. In the old days- patients sometimes saw a doctor for the duration of even a life time. That doctor was very trusted with very private patient information. And really only one doctor saw that information. The old doctors even kept the patient files in their private offices. Often times, nurses did not actually see an entire patient file. In today’s medical groups, a great deal of information is being shared about a patient visit that is actually against the law. For instance, just to name one peeve I have, and well there are more, but we won’t go into making any of that public just yet.
When I go into my doctors office, I have to write on a public sheet, a list: my doctors name, my birth-date, and whether I’m visiting for a shot or not. This information is then, there for anyone that comes into read. And, it is private information. It seems simple enough for me to just provide a staff with my name. And then, let their staff that obviously knows me as a patient do the rest.
Everyone in the health care field needs to understand security of private information as each and every individual can be held responsible for violations. Don’t rely on your doctors for the final say if you think it is a violation. After all there is a reason that liability insurance for doctors is extremely costly. All medical staff are also there to demonstrate care for a patients well-being as well as patient privacy. We entrust such staff member with our private information, and it would serve each staff member to spend a day at the legal library to make sure they are not violating people’s privacy rights. And -When you have made an appointment with a specific doctor, be careful, because, within the network of doctors, they sometimes disclose information to other doctors and even staff members that are not actually legally privy to your information. And well pretty soon, instead of an ethical doctors office, it could begin to feel like a gossiping beauty shop with the exception that beauty shops are not bound with a professional licenses to maintain ethics of your personal information and your well-being in private office with a closed door.
I’ve studied the constitution many times and have even passed my testing for knowledge of the constitution of the United States of America. Now and then, I brush up on it. I suggest that anyone within the medical field do the same. Otherwise you could find your self being fired, suspended, or sued or listed on public sites for violations on the Internet, all details of bad practise included. So, now we’ve covered plenty. And maybe I’ll think of something more to add later. But for now, when your doctor tells you you need vitamin d, go to the heath-food store and talk to a doctor of natural medicine before you take the pill directed by the Merck Manual. Be fully informed.
You decide for yourself to take the pill or not, as this still is America and maybe the pill will make you dizzy and your doctor is afraid to say he was wrong in fear of a lawsuit.
Was this article written concisely? E-mail with your opinion anytime. And thanks for reading.
I’m still trying to figure out what will be in my next book, I’m allowed to do that arn’t I, write a book?
from the studio- artist / educator TRACEE PICKETT
