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May 21, 2012
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Putting HOPE Back into Health Care

Our current health care system is ailing. Satisfaction among patients as well as health care providers is as low as it has ever been.

Even in the era of doctor making house calls, people had confidence in their doctor, who, back then, represented the health care system. Confidence was based on trust, that the doctor was offering the best treatment and advances possible.

Today, patient trust is dwindling. Yet, there is still a great deal of trust in doctors and nurses. In a recent poll, the professions that were most greatly admired and respected by the public, second to firemen, were doctors and nurses.

Lack of confidence stems not from the health providers themselves, but from the system that the doctors and nurses work for.

Let’s examine some potential areas eroding public confidence in our health care system:

1.) Speed: Our system has always moved quickly, but the current pace is nothing short of phrenetic. Oh yes, a doctor or nurse could move slower, but the price would be at the expense of patients who would not be seen or cared for that day. Quietly, health providers talk about feeling like they are part of a “conveyor belt” that treats paperwork more than it does people.

Indeed, the amount of paperwork has increased exponentially and the “system” doesn’t show any signs of slowing down. Insurance companies, particularly managed care, has heavily contributed to this additional layer of bureaucracy taking time away from patient care. At the risk of offending managed care companies, this is the truth. Managed care was originally designed to contain costs. But the impact on care of patients is one that has yet to be determined.

2.) Commercialiazation of health care: commercials etc….erodes public confidence. Patients regularly verbalize an overwhelmed and distorted image of the role of medication from watching television commercials. This is not the patient’s fault! And it works both ways, commercials can be suggestive, or implant resistance in patients who might genuinely benefit from a trial of medication. Patient’s decisions are influenced by marketing, rather than medical facts, and that just doesn’t make good clinical sense.

3.) “Pill popping society” – stems in part from commercialization but also from a stressed society looking for ways to make it easier to cope

4.) Conventional health care has yet to accept natural modalities as part of its treatment regimens. Yet, public opinion on this matter is very evident. Annual spending on Complementary/Alternative modalities exceeds ______/year. Yet, a large reason for this lack of integration into conventional health care remains lack of scientific research. Without large funding sources like pharmaceutical companies, natural treatments have been left largely to a word by mouth market.

And the word has spread like wildfire. And most often from people with chronic health challenges whose health has been restored. Yet why haven’t these potentially life-saving remedies been studied? In fact, for many health providers in conventional medicine, caring for people suffering with these chronic health challenges, it is heart wrenching not to be able to offer people more hope.

5.) The U.S. Health care system is rated 37th in the world according to the World Health Organization. Clearly these dismal results becry the need for health care solutions and transformation for the sake of our people.

Health: not simply the eradication of disease but the concept of healing, restoration and rejuvenation, particularly for those with chronic health conditions. Included in this is the incorporation of preventative health care into mainstream medicine.

Transformation of health care = Hope for all

Rebuilding confidence in the health care system with less not more [http://www.healthynutritionsite.info/]

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May 21, 2012
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How To Obtain Low Cost Health Insurance

Health insurance is a type of policy that will pay certain amount of money promised by the insurance company to the insurance holder for medical expenses or treatments as specified in the policy. It can also be defined as a protection cover that includes benefits for covered injury or sickness. It is one of the most common insurance policies across the globe. Millions of people worldwide have already purchased this policy and benefited from it.

There are several benefits of purchasing a health insurance policy. As a policy holder, you need to understand all the health insurance benefits that you are entitled to prior to purchasing health insurance. A typical health insurance policy covers you for any ancillary requirements associated to a medical condition. These include visiting to the doctor, vision care, dental care, preventative health care and pharmaceutical requirements.

It is equally important to make sure that your health insurance policy provides you the lowest premium. Finding a low cost health insurance is not as difficult as it seems to be. You need to do a research and find a health insurance policy that meets your requirements at a specific cost that you can afford.

For this, you can easily visit some of the most reputed and famous health insurance companies. Mark around four to five best companies and collect quotes. These quotes are free. Compare the cover, services and prices quoted for health insurance policy by each company. This will help you outline the policy that provides you the best and most affordable health insurance policy.

You can also look for an employer sponsored group health insurance plan. Group health insurance plans are considered to be the most affordable and low cost health insurance plans as compared to state sponsored health insurance plans.

If you can get a group health insurance plan for your employer, you would be paying less for your health insurance plan. This is more affordable option than a group health insurance plan that you purchase on your own.

There are certain requirements you need to fulfill for an employer sponsored group health insurance plan. These requirements range from employer to employer. It depends on the number of hours you work. Your status will also play an important role here. Most employers also have time requirements. This means that the employee should be with the company for a stipulated period of time before he or she is considered eligible for the employer sponsored group health insurance plan.

There are several reasons that you can avail lower premiums on employer sponsored group health insurance plans. To learn about this in detail let us assume that you have an employer sponsored group health insurance plan and the premiums are either divided between you and your employer or paid completely by your employer. This means that you are supposed to pay only half of the health insurance premiums and a low cost co-payment. You just require to pay an affordable co-payment.

If you consider covering your spouse and children under employer sponsored group health insurance plan, it will become more affordable. Here you can group the policy for all your family members rather than purchasing individual health policies for each of your family members.

Going for a low cost health insurance plan will save you a good amount of money.

For more information on health insurance, try visiting http://www.healthinsurancedecision.com – a website that specializes in health insurance tips and resources to include information on low cost health insurance.

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May 20, 2012
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Health Care Coverage Comparison

Medicare is a federal health insurance plan for people over 65 years old and some disabled people. It is the primary insurance carrier for old people and the disabled. On the other hand, blue cross is the secondary insurer that covers most of what the primary insurer fails to pay (BlueCross BlueShield Association, 2009). In its design, Medicare does not cover all health care costs which mean clients covered by Medicare are responsible for a high percentage of their health care costs. Medicare patients have to dig deep into their pockets in order to repay for some of healthcare cost.  It has been established that doctors often charge more for the services they deliver than what Medicare will pay and patients are left with a deficit to cover for medical services.  Comparing the medical cost between Medicare and Blue Cross, it is evident that in Blue cross, one pays $ 122 a month while in Medicare you pay $ 1,156.80 per year.

The two also differs in terms of service they offer.

The amount of coverage covered by Medicare depends on whether one has a coverage under Medicare part A, Medicare part B or both. Some services are not covered by Medicare and these are services that consumers have to pay direct from their pocket.  These services include:
Long term care at a nursing home or at home.
Most oral prescriptive drugs
Routine physicals.
Care for patients with Medicare as the secondary payer.
Comparison of Medicare and blue cross benefit plans on provider limitation
Medicare

Medicare is primary for retired employees covered through a retiree benefit plan by an employer. It is secondary for disabled people with a large group health plan based on their own current employment status, or those disabled individuals whose LGHP is based on a family member’s current employment status.

Medicare coverage consists of Part A and B as described below:

a. Part A covers hospitals and skilled nursing facility care. It therefore pays a portion of the hospital bills and the patient is has to find means of paying other services that are outside this bracket.

b. Part B covers medical bills and other medical expenses. Pays a portion of the doctors’ bills.

In design Medicare Plan A is mandatory while Plan B is optional. This means that those individuals who cannot afford to pay for service offered under part B will forego them since it is mandatory.

However, research  have shown that individuals covered under Medicare are not prone to out of pocket expense as they may incur some out of the pocket expenses even with Part A and B coverage. These expenses may be in different areas including:

Part A hospital deductible
Co payments for hospital stay over 60 days
Care in a skilled nursing facility after 20 days.
Part B deductible
20% co insurance for doctor bills and other medical expenses.

Therefore, Medicare can be considered as the primary medical insurer while Blue Cross is the secondary medical insurer and it pays 20% of what Medicare does not pay.

However, while Blue Cross pays more than Medicare, there is a risk. Having Blue Cross as the primary insurer at age 65 and without Medicare, Blue cross has an option of dropping you.

Medicare pays for care needed after a one time event e.g. an elderly man falling and breaking a leg but it will not pay for the need for care that gradually increases with age. This means that individuals may be required to find another cover like Blue Cross to cater for the increase expenses that comes with age.  However, Blue Cross is not self sufficient by itself as the enrollees of blue cross must use Medicare providers (Medavie Blue Cross, 2010). It is also important to understand that providers of blue cross must be certified with Medicare. Also, understand that Blue care does not pay claims if the provider is not part of Medicare.

Unlike Medicare medical treatments, drugs, devices, diagnostic procedures are not covered by Blue Cross until final review and approval by the coverage committee. It has the right to revise update or put additions to the policies at any time without prior notice (Medavie Blue Cross, 2010).

Unlike Medicare that has limited plans Blue cross comes with different health plans. Blue cross plans include:

Core medical
Anthem Blue Cross Plus
Anthem blue cross PPO
High option

Comparative prescription plan

There are notable differences in prescription between the two. Their prescription plans can be separately reviewed as follows:

Blue cross: -

Blue cross monitors the prescription of drugs through the administration of a prescription monitoring system. It uses a fully electronic online, real time system that is designed to communicate with existing pharmacy software (Medavie Blue Cross, 2010).

The prescription monitoring system offers services that include patient profiles, patient profile monitoring, analysis of prescribed patterns, and patient treatment agreement monitoring. The prescription monitoring system offers useful information to prescribers and pharmacists (Medavie Blue Cross, 2010). This helps to reduce abuse of monitored drugs. The prescription monitoring system has key features that ensure its effectiveness. These key features include real time data availability, instant messaging at the time of dispensing, refined data analysis, maintenance of provider registry and the management of triplicate prescription pads.

Medicare: -

The prescription plan for Medicare is covered in Part D. It is offered through Medicare- approved private plans. The prescription plan is available to anyone eligible for part A and/or B. It covers both brand name and generic prescription drugs (Salzman, 2005). This is done at the participating pharmacies and it helps in lowering prescription drug costs and protects against higher costs in the future (Medco Nedicare, 2009). The annual cost for the coverage depends on the type of plan that one chooses, amount of coverage that one receives, and the region where one lives.

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May 20, 2012
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What You Need To Know About Health Insurance Before You Shop For A Plan

Article by Jo Rosario

What You Need To Know About Health Insurance Before You Shop For A Plan – Health

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With so many different types of health insurance plans and restrictions out there, it can be difficult finding the best health insurance for you. Health insurance can be confusing, especially if it is your first time shopping for health insurance. You need to understand terms such as deductible, co-payments, and pre-existing conditions to find the plan that best covers your health care needs. There are a few items to look for when deciding on health insurance plans, and by considering them all you can make a good decision for yourself and your family about health insurance.


The most important thing to look for is coverage. More often than not, insurance will cover physician visits and fees. Your health insurance should also cover hospital expenses such as room and board in case you are kept overnight or longer for observation or treatment. Good health insurance should also cover surgeries and any expenses associated with surgical treatment. Beyond these typical items of coverage, health insurance plans can diverge greatly.


Do you have glasses or contacts? Then you may be more interested in a plan that covers vision – either paying for your eye exam and/or partially paying for your glasses or contacts. Though many people think that health insurance covers prescriptions, prescription coverage is actually an optional benefit. If you know that you often have prescription drugs to fill, finding insurance that offers prescription coverage may be a must. If you are a woman and plan on having or want to have children, maternity care or family planning services are also optional benefits that you may want to consider. Once you make this must-have list of optional coverage, you can begin looking for health insurance plans that give you the opportunity to add these optional benefits.


Another item you should definitely consider is if your current physicians or specialists are included in the health insurance company’s preferred provider network or if you have the opportunity to choose any physician. If you would like the freedom to choose your own doctor, traditional health insurance plans or preferred provider organizations may offer more attractive plans – though these also cost a little more.


Lastly, after researching different plans coverages, compare deductibles and monthly premiums. By researching price, as well as other health insurance options, you can make the best choices for your family.


In the United States, there are about five different types of health insurance available: traditional health insurance; preferred provider organizations or PPOs; point-of-service plans or POS; health management organizations or HMOs; and most recently, health savings accounts or HSAs. With so many types of health insurance, it may be confusing trying to figure out which one best fits your needs, so thoroughly research each and speak with a professional if you need clarification.

Traditional health insurance is the one that most people think of when they think of health insurance.


You pay the insurance company a premium every month, and if you have an accident or need for health coverage, you have a deductible amount you must pay and then the insurance company picks up the rest of the bill. You often have an inexpensive office and/or prescription co-pay with traditional health insurance.

With people living longer, health insurance companies began to look for more ways to reduce their costs, developing different health plans such as PPOs. PPOs are plans which will cover nearly all of your medical expenses as long as you stay within a preferred network of physicians or hospitals. This network creates a “preferred provider” list that you can choose from. Treatment outside this network of providers is covered but only at a reduced rate, meaning you end up paying more to see a physician outside the network. By limiting the physicians and hospitals covered in their network, the insurance company can control, to an extent, their costs and lower your premiums.


POS plans work like PPOs, but require you to have a primary care physician through whom you can receive referrals for specialists. If you need to see a neurologist or a dermatologist, you must first visit your primary care physician for an initial diagnosis in order to receive a referral to a specialist for a more thorough diagnosis. POS plans also have a preferred provider network, and if you choose to visit a specialist or physician outside that network, your coverage will be limited.


HMOs combine a stricter version of PPOs and POS plans. HMOs have a defined list of physicians, often much smaller than PPO networks, which you may see. You will not be covered at all if you see a physician outside your HMO network. Furthermore, you must also get a referral from your primary care HMO physician to see any specialist. However, these restrictions mean that you pay an extra low or no monthly premium.


HSAs were signed into law by President Bush. You can deposit money into a special non-taxed, interest-gaining savings account that must be used for medical expenses. The ideal situation for an HSA is to combine the account with a low-cost, high-deductible insurance plan. The savings account is designed to allow you to cover the high deductible if you find the need to cover expensive medical costs while the insurance company will pick up the rest of the bill.


It is important to carefully consider each option before choosing a single health insurance plan. Your health is important-make sure it is protected in the best way possible.

About the Author

If you found this article helpful visit my Medicare Advantage Plans</> website for information on Medicare insurance.

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Posted:
May 20, 2012
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Top Health Care Picks

Most of the global market’s sectors have been suffering from the economic slowdown while the health care sector has emerged as a safe environment. Year to date the SPDR S&P 500 ETF increases more than 6%. Meanwhile, the Health Care SPDR exchange-traded fund has been somewhat flat. However, according to analysts, the sector will perform in greatly various ways as businesses have the greatest potential due to innovative devices and new drugs while others’ earnings will take a hit. The following are top health care stocks to buy.

Novo Nordisk (OMX: NOVO B, NYSE: NVO) has become one of the world’s leading companies in diabetes cares. It accounts for 71% of total sales of insulin in China which is one of Asian countries with incidence of diabetes on the rise. Fortune has named Novo Nordisk in the list of 100 Best companies to work for 2010.

 

The Denmark-headquartered company has international production facilities in seven countries.

Perrigo, which manufactures and distributes OTC and general prescription pharmaceuticals, active pharmaceutical ingredients, and nutritional products, is projected to benefit from its OTC generic drug business. According to Roosevelt Investments Portfolio Manager John Roscoe, the world’s leading healthcare supplier has a 70% market share in OTC store-brand drugs.

 

Perrigo’s primary markets and locations of logistics operations include the United States, Mexico, and the United Kingdom.

Express Scripts, Inc. (NASDAQ: ESRX) will benefit from the boom in the generic drug market amid more big companies losing their patents on blockbuster drugs.

 

Missouri-based company is a Fortune 100 company.

Celgne Corporation (NASDAQ: CELG) completed its acquisition of Abraxis in June 2010. Besides manufacturing drug therapies for cancer and inflammatory disorders, the company is ambitious to expand the treatment into other forms of the disease. Celgene is expected to outperform its biotech peer over the upcoming few quarters.

 

Celgene and Abraxis BioScience Inc. signed a definitive agreement in June 2010.

UnitedHealth Group (NYSE: UNH), headquartered in Minnetonka, Minnesota, offers a spectrum of services and products through seven operating businesses namely AmeriChoice, UnitedHealthcare, OptumHealth, Ovations, Uniprise, Ingenix, and Prescription Solutions. The company posted a 2008 net income of $ 3 billion.

 

UnitedHealth Group is believed to be one of the long-term survivors of the health care reform.

Baxter International Inc. is mainly engaged in manufacturing products to treat kidney disease, hemophilia, and other chronic and acute medical conditions. Its sales reached $ 12.6 billion last year.

 

According to Cynthia R. Axelrod, an analyst for Glenmede Investment Management, the stock of Baxter International Inc. (NYSE: BAX) is driven by the growing demand for plasma.

 

 

Related links:

Providers of Health Insurance Plans See Stocks Soar

Major Stock Picking Strategies

Potential American Monopolies

Economics is the study of our lives,our jobs, our homes, our families and the little decisions we face every day. Thus, I am keen on reading and studying economic issues.

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May 20, 2012
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Retirement health care

Planning retirement has been growing more challenging over the last twenty or so years. In part this is caused by the increase in life expectancy. When we were all expected to die shortly after we retired, the government could assume it had enough cash in hand to cover the costs of looking after our health. Now the statistics show more people living into their 80′s, the federal government and individual states have been doing calculations. They have all realized there will not be enough money in the funds set aside to deal with this commitment to provide health care. The first sign of this was the change in the linkage between Social Security and Medicare benefits. Originally, we were eligible to get both benefits at the age of 65. Now you can still get Medicare at 65 but, depending on your birthday, you may have to wait until 67 to get retirement benefits.

To trigger the Medicare coverage, contact Social Security within the three month period before your 65th birthday.

It’s better to do this even if you intend to keep on working and a group health plan covers you. There’s a Special Enrollment Period that applies if you or your spouse has a Plan. If you want guidance on the costs and benefits, you should call Social Security. However, the issue of health care retirement funding has become a legal hot potato as more states find their budgets under pressure. One of the most interesting examples is in Michigan. First Gov. Jennifer Granholm and now Gov. Rick Snyder have been leading the efforts to make major savings across all aspects of the state’s activities. The plans calls for a reduction in next year’s projected deficit of $ 1.4 billion, with measures to save not less than $ 3.5 billion over the next ten years.

In 2010, the lawmakers required public school employees to pay 3% of their earnings into the retirement and health care funds. In particular, this was intended to avoid a projected loss of about $ 360 million in the School Aid Fund. The important feature of this fund is that it covers the health care costs and pays out pensions to current retirees. The cost is about 24% of the school districts’ budgets but, as the courts have pointed out, there’s no guarantee that younger people paying into this fund will ever receive benefits. This has led the judges in two separate cases to hold the laws unconstitutional. It would probably be lawful to increase the deductions from pay if the teachers were guaranteed a benefit. As it is, the courts have knocked a big hole in Michigan’s efforts to close the deficit gap.

Health insurance plans come under pressure from all sides. The employees find their contributions inching up. This eats into their disposable income. The employers find their own budgets going into deficit, while the healthcare insurers find everyone reluctant to continue paying higher premiums when nothing is done to control the healthcare providers’ costs. No one objects to paying when they feel the benefits they receive are good value for money. But when health insurance as part of the retirement process may be compromised because the states have not been making adequate provision for payment, everyone is right to be angry.

aidanjesse has shared his vision and professional opinion on a vast array of topics and http://www.cuthealthcarecosts.net/articles/health-insurance-for-those-retiring.html is one of the sites where you can read more of aidanjesse’s contributions.

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May 20, 2012
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What does it take to put health care on top?

Article by sosaadele

What does it take to put health care on top? – Health

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Imagine a medical system where there is no charge for health care. Patients no longer need to go to one scattered private office after the other to get their health needs fixed for they can find doctors in neighborhood health centers, health supermarkets which guarantee their convenience. The way the government shoulders nurses’ salaries will be applied to doctors. And since they represent only a small part of the community, they have only a minority voice in running hospitals. In dealing with policy matters, only health workers and consumers possess the final say. You can get the best doctor jobs information by visiting this website.

The group of activists working for change in the medical arena, known as the health policy advisory center states that this is the best of all possible health care worlds. They are the health movement’s thinking team as well as propagandists. The health care scene feels the thundering voices of these dissenters whether or not the descriptions fit the bill.

People believe it’s too idealistic to strive for consumer controlled hospitals or even talk about free health care. But it isn’t more money that’s going to improve health care in this country, only a total restructuring of the system is going to do that. The center staff is made of three city planners, a molecular biology expert, an anthropologist, a labor relations expert and a social worker and all of them hold office inside a cramped loft set in downtown Manhattan. All make about the same amount of money a week and have the same say in decisions.

They are all striving to drive health workers to rally around medical concerns along with many consumer organizations. This autonomous, not profit alliance spearheads informative campaigns on health financing and patients’ rights through comprehensive talks and workshops. But the prime outlet would still be their 12 to 16 magazine published monthly that targets various issues on a featured establishment. This site teaches you about medical recruitment agency.

For the newly established radical health groups, the current health problems the country is facing is due to the nonsystem of most medical delivery methods. Furthermore, the system is the prime cause of the concern since they focus on profit, research and expansion instead of health care per se. This medical care system, or simply the American health empire, has three components, as perceived by the policy advisory center.

First in line are the medical centers, hospitals as well as the medical schools and universities. The concerns of the citizens do not matter to them as it is the doctors’ interests they serve. Their priorities are teaching and research first and health care second. We strongly believe that health care must be on top.

The challenge of financial planning comes in second on the health care system’s list. Half of the hospital income is shouldered by the health insurance companies which makes them an essential player. But instead of riding herd on hospitals’ spending and building, it is closely allied with them. For example many of these regional directors are hospital administrators, too. The advocacy group strongly blames this hospital dominated firm for its inability to secure proper costs measures as well as quality control policies with the huge amount of hospital costs.

The third part of the health system is the medical industrial complex. This complex being referred to is actually the conspiracy between providers like physicians, medical schools, hospitals and clinics that all earn from health problems, drug companies, hospital supplies firms, insurance groups, nursing care homes as well as laboratories. Their sole goal is earning and the connection between providers and profit oriented folks is so visible. Executives of drug companies are usually directors in the hospital board too. Most physicians today are shareholders of high grossing hospitals and hospital supply corporations. Acting as consultant for hospital supply corporations is something many hospital and medical school employees are getting into nowadays.

But many ask that if there is truly some truth to their claims that their present system is efficient and widespread, then why do they lack resources for health care? The center says that the answer is that health care is not the aim of the health care system, it exists to serve its own ends, teaching and research, expansion of real estate and financial holdings, and profits. The means to achieve these ends is health care. However, in itself, this is not the sole end.

About the Author

My career began in data entry and I moved up through mid-range and mainframe computing operations, to client/server and distributed systems. In the Spring of 2000 I made a career change from internal IS professional to consultant

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Posted:
May 20, 2012
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Achievable ways to get reasonable health insurance quote

Article by Theodoreroosevelt

Achievable ways to get reasonable health insurance quote – Insurance – Health Coverage

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Finding reasonable health insurance in the US is no longer tricky. By implementation a prescribed form you will get a free proportional health insurance quote from national carries and local agents licensed to offer quotes in your state. When you contact your local agent make sure to find out about Dental, Vision, Life and other additional products that are often obtainable to health insurance policy holders at reasonable rates.

The requirements for availing reasonable health insurance polices differ from state to state. There are group of health insurance companies who are vying by one another to offer you an affordable health insurance quote. This competition is a huge advantage for you as a health insurance consumer. Privacy may be the number one issue for the majority people who are shopping for a reasonably priced health insurance policy online. Nearly all of the online health insurance quote sites comprise their privacy policy and make clear to you how the information you provide is used.

In some case, most sites that present affordable online health insurance quotes remain to their stated privacy policies. When you provide your personal information, the particulars you submit are strictly used only to settle on which benefits and options you are suitable for and which plan would suit you best. When you fill in the simple profile form to get health care plan proposals, you will be given up to five quotes from top companies. You can then efficiently make a proportional study before making your choice.

The information you offer on the free health quote forms is given to a qualified, licensed health insurance agent / agent who will then contact you directly to answer any questions you may have. The agent who meets you generally lives in your area and familiar with your state laws and programs. The insurance section of the state you survive in regulates all insurance companies and agents. The certified insurance agent will provide you with all the affordable health insurance information, particulars of various individual health insurance coverage options as healthy as methods to save on expenses.

The health insurance agent will review your current coverage or lack of health insurance coverage. The agent can present specific recommendations to meet your health insurance requirements. Their main goal is to make affordable health insurance coverage and individual health insurance security fall within your financial plan limits. One way of ensuring this happens is to ask the health insurance agent to offer you an outline of the health insurance coverage, which summarizes the various benefits and features of the health insurance plan.

There are different types of health policy for you to decide from. Customary Health Insurance generally called a PPO (preferred provider organization) is the most common collection plan as well as the best known individual insurance. You prefer your doctor or hospital from a list of doctors who have agreed to believe the insurance as payment in full minus your deductible. You can go to a doctor outside the complex, but will pay a higher percentage of the cost.

Health Maintenance Organization (HMO) Insurance policy is less expensive than normal health insurance. In an HMO you have a primary care doctor and cannot go to some other doctor without his/her authorization and if you do, the insurance company will not pay. The prime intention of the HMOs is to keep your health care expenses to a minimum and the doctor will not send you to an expert unless it is absolutely necessary.

Insurance plans were marketed in the early 70s as plans whose chief aim was to pay you back if you received medical care for any kind of accident. The protection play would pay you on top of whatever your insurance remunerated. Today indemnity plans are obtainable that pay moreover you or the hospital for both illness and accident.

About the Author

Theodore Roosevelt is an expert author for anthem blue cross individual group plans. He has written many articles like anthem blue cross of California. For information visit our site pacificare health insurance plans.

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Posted:
May 19, 2012
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The World of Chaos: Organized Medicine + Politics = Health Care Reform

Article by Moshe Sharon

The World of Chaos: Organized Medicine + Politics = Health Care Reform – Health

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We used to say the two biggest lies are “The check is in the mail” and “It won’t hurt a bit.” Now, there is a third biggest lie, which is, “We have the best health care system in the world,” as Bill Clinton and George Bush uttered repeatedly during their respective terms. On the other hand, all of the standard measures of health care quality points to ours as being “the best substandard price-gouging health care system in the world”. One such measure is a comparison of cost and longevity. For example, Americans live an average of 77 years at a cost of $ 4,800 per person per year, while Spain, Canada and Japan respectively have life span-to-cost ratios of 79 years at $ 1,100, 81.5 years at $ 2,100, and 81 years at $ 2,000.

Another measure is the infant death rate per one thousand live births and the U.S. has a rate comparable to third world countries at 6.9 compared to 5.3 in Denmark, 4.6 in France, 3.4 in Sweden and 3.2 in Japan. Additionally, the World Health Organization ranks the United States as 37th in the world, which puts us just behind Costa Rica.

Therefore, we can see that the people of other countries get better outcomes for much less cost, suggesting that we Americans are paying more for inferior quality products and services. Although President Obama and other politicians acknowledge that health care is too expensive, they seem to be downplaying the fact that organized medicine has been giving the public a royal hosing for decades.

Some of the problems with U.S. health care delivery as many other experts have also pointed out are as follows:

Hospitals, nursing homes and clinics are unsafe with medical and nursing negligence being the fifth largest cause of death in the United States.
Lack of access with 76 million uninsured (adding illegal aliens) and 106 million underinsured;
Out of control cost with health care being 16% of gross domestic product (GDP) at $ 1 trillion which is a 250% increase over the last 25 years;
Price gouging, with hospitals and doctors charging uninsured patients 1000% more than they accept from third party payers;
HMO premium price gouging with high deductibles charging 300% more for individuals who purchase directly rather than through a group;
Health care corporations are guilty of bilking billions of dollars from tax payers with fraudulent billing practices;
Doctors perform unnecessary surgery with bogus diagnoses;
H.M.O. members have to call for approval before going to emergency rooms with call centers outsourced to non-professional personnel in India and other countries;
Administrative cost of DRG’s and CPT codes is $ 375 billion per year – 25% of total health care expenditures;
Pharmaceutical companies obtain FDA approval for toxic drugs by paying large research grants to medical research facilities to achieve favorable results;
Pharmaceutical companies pay bribes to physicians to prescribe their over-priced toxic drugs with tens of thousands falling prey to side effects.
This short list of scams and rackets is really the largest, most harmful and costly criminal conspiracy in history. The perpetrators include HMO’s, pharmaceutical companies, hospital and physician groups and politicians. Additionally, with the political corruption achieved through expensive lobbying to defeat all attempts to impose regulatory standards, we can see why we pay such exorbitant prices for such shabby health care.

To explain further, medical care has always been a business whereby the seller decides what the consumer will purchase and how much. Couple that control with fear of death, and the buyer will pay any price for care on any terms. Moreover, the people of our generation and the previous one grew up trusting our doctors and listening for the most part, to what they recommended. Then medicine evolved moving from cottage industry to commercial empires.

However, to our disadvantage, we still had this mindset of “doctor knows best” for decades while the entire paradigm of ethics changed to acceptance of greedy commercialism with corporate executives capturing financial control of health care operations and finding ways to deny coverage for expensive services and equipment rentals with the pre-approval requirement fraud. Once a well-meaning physician prescribes a treatment, a non-professional decides whether it is medically necessary. Physicians, who became financially dependent upon their corporate “bosses”, would have to capitulate. Then Congress stepped in and gave legislative immunity to HMO’s from lawsuits for wrongful death and damages caused by withholding approval for life-sustaining treatment, thus leaving the doctors and hospitals holding the proverbial bag with malpractice lawsuits. The whole scenario was like putting a hungry shark in a pond to take care of the fish. The shark, knowing that if he swallows everyone in one gulp he won’t last long, says to each of his group members, “There is something wrong with the way your tail is functioning so I’m going to have to bite part of it off for your own good,” and the tasty fish replies, “You’re the doctor.”

In conclusion, there have been some suggested health care reform models coming from various think tanks such as “public good”, which is government provided or contracted care, versus the “public utility model”, being privately owned health care with quality standards and pricing controlled by a government agency like public utilities. Although we get a lot of pundits and politicians arguing the pros and cons for both but we are lacking a viable solution.

On the other hand, to come up with a workable infrastructure, we first need to abandon those policies that have ended in disaster, such as using financial incentives to control physician behavior, defining health care as providing diagnostics, drugs and surgery and autocratic corporate control of treatment plans. Furthermore, we have to stop believing in this myth called “freedom of choice” as if there was any free choice in health care to begin with. This term has become a way to placate us into accepting a crappy plan charging us more for less by saying, “We have preserved your freedom to choose.” So what if I don’t like the pond that I’m swimming in? I can look for another one with a different shark.

On the other hand, there is another fiddle that came from Washington, D.C. called “health care reform”. We now have a new president and his political hacks in Congress who say they have revolutionized the health care industry by making it cheaper, better, more accessible and safer. The problem is that this administration and its pork barrel Congress has no clue as to what preventable errors cause the killing of 200,000 people annually in hospitals across the country, and even if they wanted to stop the carnage they wouldn’t be able to figure out how.

As we listen to the political rhetoric about the current state of health care and how to improve it, we get a sense that health care is not so bad and we can make it better. On the contrary, when we go to a hospital as a patient or to visit and we see that people have to wait thirty minutes for a bed pan to avoid soiling themselves, we wake up to a different reality in the world of chaos. Therefore, as we examine the new health care reform schemes, we can quickly ascertain that our elected officials are planning to put more fish in the ponds and tell the sharks to take smaller bites.

About the Author

Moshe Sharon, author of “Health Secrets from the Seventh Heaven”, has been a registered nurse for 31 years with a graduate degree and specialty in public health. He has spent most his career in search of ways to achieve true healing for those who are not yet well. He has studied and practiced holistic health care for two decades, always believing in the inseparability of the mind, body and spirit.

Use and distribution of this article is subject to our Publisher Guidelines

whereby the original author’s information and copyright must be included.

Moshe Sharon


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Posted:
May 19, 2012
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