Fishing - Why that sonofabitch...

FishingBanter (http://www.fishingbanter.com/index.php)

- Fly Fishing (http://www.fishingbanter.com/forumdisplay.php?f=6)

- - Why that sonofabitch... (http://www.fishingbanter.com/showthread.php?t=31193)

Why that sonofabitch...

"Wayne Knight" wrote in message
. ..

"Calif Bill" wrote in message
m...

Major reason for the huge healthcare costs

Look dude, opinions are like assholes so you and BJ are entitled to yours
but as someone once posted, you guys are not entitled to your own facts.

There's a myriad number of reasons that compound the issues regarding the
costs and access to health care services in this country but HMO's,
defensive medicine, and lawsuits are not a major player in the total
costs. And the average ER visit in my healthcare system and state is
signifcantly less than a grand and the effing quality is pretty damn good,
not perfect everywhere but much higher than being "ranked" #37.

Now back to your regulary scheduled whatever y'all want to call this.

Facts is facts and the fact is lawsuits add greatly to healthcare costs. Go
to the ER and even a doctors office and they will run a lot of tests not
really needed, unless you are there for some minor scrape on the arm. Those
tests are run to prevent a suit that will cost at least $100k to defend.
Whether or not the case is won or lost. I never complained about the
healthcare quality. Is always been great. My mother is an RN. Licensed
until this year and she is 93. So I have been around healthcare all my life
and also part of my career was doing the electronic engineering and software
for biomedical devices. The threat of suits adds lots. As well as the fact
that the system is overused by the lowest income groups. You are MediCal or
what ever it is called in the state you are in and they will go to the ER
for everything. Those copays used to be really low at Kaiser and like my
stepfather, there were those who would go to 2 different hospitals to get a
blood pressure check. Did not trust the first hospital and since the
hospitals were not far apart, he cost the system a lot more than he paid.
And anybody who shows up at an ER will be treated! Is the law. They may be
transferred to a county hospital later, but they will be treated. Legal,
illegal does not matter. If they have no assets they will never pay.

Why that sonofabitch...

"Calif Bill" wrote in message
m...

So I have been around healthcare all my life

i've been around electricity all my life, that doesn't mean I can tell the
power company how to engineer a power plant.

And anybody who shows up at an ER will be treated! Is the law.

The law requires evaluation and stabilization of a life threatening
condition.

Stick to fishing dude.

Why that sonofabitch...

On Fri, 4 Apr 2008 06:13:52 -0400, "Wayne Knight"
wrote:

"Calif Bill" wrote in message
om...

So I have been around healthcare all my life

i've been around electricity all my life, that doesn't mean I can tell the
power company how to engineer a power plant.

And anybody who shows up at an ER will be treated! Is the law.

The law requires evaluation and stabilization of a life threatening
condition.

Um, Wayne, I think he might be talking about "public"/taxpayer-supported
hospitals. I don't know what the codes say in each area, but I can tell
you that in each area of that which I am familiar, there is a county,
city, or parish hospital that will and does treat people who can't pay
for service.

An sorta-related story about this - I'm not sure if it is done this way
nationwide, or even anywhere but the hospital in question, but...

I once received a bill from a hospital by mistake, the mistake being
that I had not received any service from the hospital. I called their
accounting department to explain/complain, and they actually told me
they would need to get approval from some muckitymuck to cancel the
bill. Oh, they said, they understood that I had not been in their
hospital, but a bill is a bill. Uh-huh. So, OK, what's a few days.
Well, it's as long as it takes to send me a corrected bill. Same
alleged services, only about 1/3 the previous amount. I call back. Oh,
says they, since you don't have insurance, the amount is less. Er,
well, I do have insurance, but I still didn't receive these services.
OH! YOU _DO_ HAVE INSURANCE?! Give us the policy info and we'll bill
them! Er, look, perhaps you ought to let me speak to your boss. Long
story shortened, I finally got someone who, admittedly after some minor
threatening of legal action by me, took care of the situation.

However, it came out in the various contacts that I had that they
actually bill on some form of sliding scale, from $0 for folks who can't
pay anything to a moderate amount to folks with no insurance (they never
asked what I could afford or anything else) to a whole bunch to
insurance companies.

OTOH, I've seen health care all over the world, and the US is one of the
few places I'd wish to be if I needed serious medical treatment, and if
I had no money or insurance, the list would be even shorter, with the US
at or near the top.

TC,
R

Stick to fishing dude.

Why that sonofabitch...

On Apr 4, 5:11*am, wrote:
On Thu, 3 Apr 2008 20:58:18 -0700 (PDT), wrote:
- Show quoted text -

Actually I think they may elect Bush as the next Prez of Iram. He has
earned it. After all he is responsible for vastly increasing the power
and influence of Iran in the World. He attacked and weakened the
Taliban, a sworn enemy of Iran. Bush then knocked out Saddam, another
major enemy of Iran, and then put a Sheite government friendly to Iran
in charge in Iraq for the first time in Iraq's history. Bush and his
Neo-clowns have done more to make things comfy for the Iranian right-
wingers and religous zelots than any Iranian politician could have.

OK, how? *Provide some actual data, as opposed to unsupported
statements, that show that Iranian kooks, such as Ahmadinejad, have more
power "in the World" (or even in Iran) or are "comfy." *I'm not talking
about press clippings that simply offer rhetoric about it, I'm talking
about actual data.

HTH,
R

Dave- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

Assuming for a moment that you concede that the wars in Iraq,
deposition of Saddam, and the Taliban 1.) occurered, and 2.) that
these events helped Iran . . . . it is possible that you havn't
noticed the increased significance of Iran, so. . . . .

Well, let's see, Amadinejad did just recently make an invited State
visit to Bahgdad, or so the media would have us believe, and damn if
it didn't look like the Iraqis were cheering him. Seems the Sheite
Prez of Iraq (Our allies?) invited him, and he came, went thru the
streets with a minimal guard and said among other things that the US
should get out. Compared to Bush's scared pussy behaviour on his
recent visit I'd say the comparision was embarrassing. Of course the
video that the whole world saw might not be real.

Oh, and I'm probably naive to believe that the drubbing the Iranian
backed Hezbellah administered to the Israeli IDF in Lebonon, despite
all the cluster bomblets Bush rush shipped so the IDF could cover its
tail-between-the-legs retreat with explosives specifically designed to
be attractive to children. . . well I guess that whole fiasco was
designed to show how weak Iran is, and the Israeli inquiry is probably
a fake too. But to me it suggested that maybe our approaches in the
Middle East need some reconsideration. And that Hamas thingy in Gaza,
meaningless right?

Then there are the various deployments of US forces around Iran, Oh
and that ABM defence thingy. . . but these could just be pretending to
be there to counter growing Iranian power, right?

No Richard, your team has done much to remove Iran's enemies, enhance
Iran's friends, and weaken the opposition reformers and liberals
inside Iran. The ignorant American right-wing are Amadinejad's and the
right-wing mullahs best (and witless) supporters.

Face it Richard, the team you supported, actually the team the
electoral majority supported, has run our country right into the ditch
with its hatred of and incompetence in government, ignorance of the
World, arrogance, venality, and disrespect for the Constitution. It is
clear that one large cluster f--- has occurred and the Bush/Neo-clown
team is best put behind us asap. My guess is that most Americans want
to get on with the work of cleaning up the mess, and prosecuting the
theives and the criminals in the administration and their contractors.
(There is after all, $16 billion still missing.)

I think the best we can do now is to avoid the petty slanders of the
three candidates for what will be one of the toughest first terms ever
faced by an American President.

Translation: "Nope, I have nothing substantive whatsoever...but
anti-Bush stuff, I got LOTS of that..."

Dave
Ideology still sucks

Well, any but yours, anyway...

HTH,
R- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

Stop, stop,stop. You don't have to defend these clowns. At least in
the second election he did win it. The electoral majority made the
same mistake as you. And got screwed. But it is time to learn from
what happened, and get down to fixing the mess. And pretending its not
a big mess will not get it fixed. And that is what we have to do . . .
as united as we can be whoever is President.

You owe these clowns no loyality. To the extent that you hold
conservative principles, the Bushies/Neo clowns betrayed you, at least
in terms of civil liberties, individual rights, and big deficit
spending, Ask any real conservative. Even if you supported the War, or
felt once we were in it the Bushies deserved your support, their
execution and war profiteering has been inexcusable. (They fired every
general who would not drink the Koolaide, and failed even in practical
tasks like expediciously up-armoring our military transport. The
theives deserve a bullet, but unfortunately that isn't going to
happen.)

There are enough honest Republicans left at the State, local and
congressional level for people of that persuasion to vote their DNA.
(On the right day I could even donate $ to folks like Nebraska's
Chuck). But it is important for folks not to be taken in again by the
Dodsons (Christian nutbag leader), Norquists ( Right-wing anarchist/
Trotskyist), and Fromne (Non-US citizen/propagandist/Zionist) who are
telling people like you to sabatoge any post Bush President (McCain,
Clinton or Obama) so that they can get back in power 9 years from now.

A sober look at the mess we are in, some basic degree of non-partisan
unity and a focus of our energies and talents on the problems at hand
are what is required of us at this point in our national history.

Dave
Ideology still sucks

Why that sonofabitch...

wrote in message
...

Um, Wayne, I think he might be talking about "public"/taxpayer-supported
hospitals.

He was referencing the "Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor
Act"-EMTALA. It requires a patient be given a screening examination and
treatment for life threatening situations before they are transferred or
discharged. It doesn't entitle one to carte blanche services tho some think
it does.

Yes, there are certain states/counties/cities with taxpayer supported
facilities but even they have to bill something and EMTALA applies to them.
And the industry has tried to deal with the cost of the ininsured issue in
many different ways, including sliding payment scales. We charge the same
rates but certain payers, including government payers often pay less than
the full rate and we accept those payments as payment in full. Some of it is
legislated, some is contracted. This has led to a convulted pricing system
and left self pay patients paying the entire charge because they had no
contract to get a discount. This system has led to numerous complaints and
law suits. It is but one part of the problem in getting at a solution for
the total health care cost. Generally speaking, our charges don't have crap
to do with actual costs but more to do with cost shifting and revenue
enhancement challenges amongst the myriad number of payment schemes out
there. There are a bunch of pros and cons for a single payor system, but IMO
the biggest pro is that it would end the constant rate setting game we play.

You ran across a grossly mismanaged unengaged hospital business office. I
hope I never cross their path.