How to Run a Medicare Surplus Without Raising Taxes or Cutting Benefits

Newsmax ^ | 4-29-17 | Chuck Bolotin

[logi_cal869]

Such bullshit.

This solves nothing nor stimulates debate with asinine suggestions.

[pierrem15]

When my wife and I had BCBS, we had a list of foreign facilities that accepted BSBS and were encouraged to use them.

The current system here is sputtering to a halt because costs are rising from ludicrous to astronomical. As a consequence, deductibles are rising so fast that soon most people even with insurance will not seek medical care except for emergencies. When that point is reached, there's no longer any point to paying for the insurance.

The end result will be a clamor for "single payer," which will seek to dictate cost reductions by lowering reimbursement rates. Then hospitals and physicians' practices will simply close.

If we don't address the costs (principally malpractice and the administrative nightmare of 50+ individual state regulations plus Federal), in a few years almost no one will have medical care.

[stylin19a]

thanks. something needs to be done.
Maybe a voucher is the answer.

I went to CMS(Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services) to see about Inpatient Hospital Medicare payments. (not doctors fees)

The last year for statistics is 2014.
The actual costs & dollars paid are staggering.

one example:

Heart Transplant
University of Alabama

average charge $1,172,866.38
average payment $251,876.31
average medicare payment $244,457.92
13 patients.
then add the doctors fees to all that.

there were 1,518 heart transplant discharges throughout the U.S. in 2014.

Charges\payments are greater or lesser depending on the part of country the hospital is in.

[BwanaNdege]

Thank you!

[oldasrocks]

Supposedly 34% of all Medicare payments are fraudulent. How about stopping some of those?

[libertylover]

So...why do so many Canadians come to the U.S. when they have a serious problem?

[DannyTN]

Your idea is horrible:

• It offshores even more jobs.
• It doesn't fix the American healthcare system at all.
• It will make American healthcare even more expensive, as the volume drops, but the fixed costs of facilities and management overhead and regulatory compliance remain the same.
• It sends people to countries where there may not be good controls or the ability to sue if incompetence abounds.
• You can't usually fly to other countries in an emergency.

[BwanaNdege]

Supposedly 34% of all Medicare payments are fraudulent. How about stopping some of those?

Just make the penalties for fraud and other "white collar" crimes the same as for the "blue collar" thefts.

Equal dollar amounts receive equal penalties.

Of course, there needs to be an "add-on" or multiplier for violence or threat thereof.

But, if you walk up to the bank teller window with a note saying "give me all your money", collect $5,000 and receive a sentence (when caught) of 5 years, then defrauding SS, Medicare, your client, embezzlement, etc. of $5,000 needs to receive the same sentence.

Perhaps "white collar" crimes also need a multiplier if the perpetrator is an officer of the law, an elected official or an attorney.

Integrated "white collar" and "blue collar" non-violent prisoner populations.

[ThankYouFreeRepublic]

Mostly they come to the US for the same reason they come to Mexico, Panama, etc.; because they have to wait too long in Canada, even though healthcare there is “free”.

[ThankYouFreeRepublic]

It offshores even more jobs. True; mostly of bureaucrats.

It doesn’t fix the American healthcare system at all. Also true. We don’t have the political will to fix it, so we have to do something else before we all go bankrupt.

It will make American healthcare even more expensive, as the volume drops, but the fixed costs of facilities and management overhead and regulatory compliance remain the same. Unlikely. Competition tends to drive costs down, not up. As another poster mentioned, it will also put pressure on the US healthcare system to become more efficient, as its monopoly is withdrawn.

It sends people to countries where there may not be good controls or the ability to sue if incompetence abounds. Just like it was in the US when we had the best healthcare in the world. Letting people choose what to do is a great control and people do tend to want good doctors for their surgeries, and not just depend on the controls we have in Medicare.

You can’t usually fly to other countries in an emergency. True. This is not for emergencies.

The question is not if this solution is perfect, it is, is it better than what we have.

[CurlyDave]

In my lifetime, when I went to see a GP he had one office assistant, almost always a woman. She wore a white uniform and many thought she was a nurse, but she was an office assistant. She made appointments, took in cash, did some bookkeeping, and was present when a male Dr. examined a woman. The Dr. paid her salary.

Today the same Dr. will have 2 or 3 assistants, a couple of insurance billing specialists, and a full time bookkeeper. The Dr. pays their salaries. Now the insurance companies have 3 or 4 people on staff to reject the bills from the Dr. unless they are exactly correct, and a supervisor for them.

So, today we have 10 straphangers for every Dr. and someone must pay their salaries.

It doesn’t have to be that way...

[ThankYouFreeRepublic]

How you describe how it used to be in the US is how, for the most part it is in places like Mexico and Panama. That’s the main reason the costs are so much lower (like they used to be in the US)

[ThankYouFreeRepublic]

Hi, libertylover.

There are two main reasons so many Canadians come to the US when they have a serious problem:

1. The healthcare system in Canada is state run, so there can be lots of waiting.

2. For some very serious and unusual illnesses, the US still leads the world in treatment options.

The article didn’t say that every healthcare system in the world is better or less expensive than that in the US. It just said that many are, for the vast majority of problems. Please read the article.