Posted on 07/08/2015 7:53:20 PM PDT by Steelfish
Medicare Plans to Pay Doctors for Counseling on End of Life By PAM BELLUCKJULY 8, 2015
Medicare, the federal program that insures 55 million older and disabled Americans, announced plans on Wednesday to reimburse doctors for conversations with patients about whether and how they would want to be kept alive if they became too sick to speak for themselves.
The proposal would settle a debate that raged before the passage of the Affordable Care Act, when Sarah Palin labeled a similar plan as tantamount to setting up “death panels” that could cut off care for the sick. The new plan is expected to be approved and to take effect in January, although it will be open to public comment for 60 days.
Medicare’s plan comes as many patients, families and health providers are pushing to give people greater say about how they die — whether that means trying every possible medical option to stay alive or discontinuing life support for those who do not want to be sustained by ventilators and feeding tubes.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
Paging Dr. Kevorkian
Palliative End of Life Optimum Serenity Initiative (PELOSI).
cut off care for the sick
"Just give 'em a pill." Obama
I think everyone knows doctors already conduct these discussions (e.g. DNR “do not resuscitate” orders) with patients as deemed appropriate. Now they can turn in a bill for it. Not a death panel or anything remotely like it.
Apply any and all means available to sustain my life.
I will provide no excuse for somebody withholding food, water, or air.
Is it more selfish for me to want to live or for somebody else deciding I should die?
Don’t bother with meme’s about “quality of life” or “dignity”.
That’s all about other people being uncomfortable with your situation.
I was on a feeding tube, following cancer treatment, so I don’t need any lectures.
DNR is THE PATIENT’S DECISION!!
Not the Doctor’s!!!
Please don't confuse us with facts. We're on a roll. You're screwing up the narrative.
> DNR is THE PATIENT’S DECISION!!
Not the Doctor’s!!!
Obamacare’s decision if the annual tax revenue produced by the patient is less than $10K (j/k for now...)
I’m at an age and poor health where some of my doctors try to broach that topic with me, but I put them off. I usually suggest to them that maybe they, too, might be approaching that point in life. That usually shuts them up.
patient or patients family decision
When my grandmother could still reason ~ 90 my mother helped her make up a living will that said that she shouldn't be kept alive on tubes for more than some limited amount of time, like a few days, at her request.
Turns out that she lived to be 101 but by the time she turned 100 she just slept all the time, The nurses aid would wake her up to get her to drink Ensure from time to time to keep he alive.
Sad as her last 9 years were , at least she was able to avoid a nursing home. Those places are expensive hell usually paid by medicaid,
I like my primary care physician. As long as he’s getting paid for it, and it doesn’t add anything to my bill...I look forward to the discussion. I’m glad to help him suck some money out of the government.
Thank you for sharing this.
What happened to “old people” prior to nursing homes? Did they just die younger?
It should not now or ever be considered a billable service. Making it a billable service is nothing more than a bribe avoiding the blowback from imposing more regulations on physicians. It will also set the narrative.
CMS will define exactly what is considered counseling which might not include the bottom line, what do we want done (or not). The emphasis will be what we should do.
That is long before my time and I am not young.
I recall a early memory ~ 6 or 7 a great aunt, my Grandfathers sister never married ~ 70, developed some condition where she couldn't take care of herself (Osteoporosis I think ) and her brothers emptied her house out and sold everything and put her in a nursing home where we visited her.
She was one of four. Her three brothers wives certainly were not going to play nurses aid to her, I know my grandmother wouldnt.
More recently my uncle had a real bad stroke and his wife about 15 years younger did get him out of a nursing home after a year and took care of him at home. It saved them money and he would have died much sooner in that nursing home of neglect.
Oh boy. :(
My Mom used to say she’d steal one of my guns and kill herself before she ever went into a nursing home. Fortunately, she was 100% active and fine up until the moment she (unfortunately) died.
My uncle: “If I can’t take care of myself anymore, I’ll find a way to get to my place in Maine and disappear into the woods. It works for other animals like dogs.”
My grandmother who lived to be 101 used to tell me that she would take a ‘black pill’ before she reaches the point where she needs full time nursing care.
I used to reply that they don't sell those in the drug store.
She had to be picked up and cleaned up (couldn't use the toilet at all) for her last ~ 8 years of life
She was a completely different person,.
I'll tell him I want to die with my hands around the throat of an Obamacare architect.
“The Black Pill”: They had a fake one one in the movie “MASH”, when the camp dentist thought he was a fag and wanted to kill himself.
Yep, we don’t let pets suffer like we let people. :(
RIP to your relatives that suffered.
My grandmother once made a similar point, about a pet my Mom had who was very sick and long needed to be put down, and my Mom was having trouble making the decision.
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