Cost of Healthcare Transparency Is Trust in the American System

We have excellent facilities, mainly excellent care (if we have good insurance), and generally well trained doctors and caregivers.

When dealing with life and death matters, things don't always turn out rosey, and sometimes errors occur. This is not grounds for massive "mistrust". The inefficiencies and financial nightmares associated with healthcare are what need to be fixed.

I just went through a major health event ultimately requiring surgery. I filled out too many forms, saw too many doctors, took too many tests, sat in too many waiting rooms, paid too many deductibles, argued too often with billing departments wanting to collect overbilling that should have been written off, recieved statements from doctors, statements from the insurance company, statements before insurance paid, statements after insurance paid, statements after remaining balances are written down, statements showing the balanced cleared in full. I had duplicate blood tests, multiple forms, and received invoices from doctors I never met but somewhere along the line they looked at one of my sonograms. I received invoices from companies I never heard of in Arkansas for procedures done in South Carolina. I paid thousands of dollars out of pocket because I couldn't have the surgery in December because the doctors were all booked up or were out on holiday.

Bottom line - HUGE waste of my time, paper, paperwork, employee hours to process it all, no central records database, major expense to me (and I can afford it), over $20,000 paid by my insurance company, and if I had another health event, it would all be repeated again.

We have to get universal health care. I have lived overseas and had it before and it was great. I went to the MD, showed my ID card, and saw no invoices, deductible payments or increases in my premiums. I did not wait for service. the doctors were excellent, the hospitals immaculate.

I had no worries about limits for certain services. People did not go bankrupt when they became ill. Old people were not trading pill expense for food. Those who do not think the standard coverage is adequate could purchase additional insurance that gave them more private rooms and exotic treatment options. But everyone has the basic service. Employers do not have to pay insurance for employees, so their costs are way lower.

The cost to you and I? The same amount we pay now for health insurance if employed. The difference? No one is turned away, totally portable if you change jobs, available anywhere you live or vacation. This is possible due to the efficiencies of having everyone in one pool - purchasing supplies, medications, centralized patient information, no more outdated walls of paper files, no more piles of paperwork to insurance companies for reimbursement claims, no more separate doctor bills to generate and collect. The doctors make very good money, so they are not suffering either.

It is time. Let's fix this instead.

Dorfy of SC 3:43PM February 25, 2009