The High Cost of Healthcare: Your Life

Interesting that people can spend $3600 a year for a cell phone, $500.00 for new tires on a car, $700 for a t.v., but balk at spending money to get themselves well.  

The article spoke of a mark up on prices for medicine, yes, standard practice in every market that delivers services to consumers.  

As a provider how many would be willing to take a significant pay cut so a patients bill will not be so high?  How many of us would work for free just so a person who does not have insurance gets the care they need?

Those in the health industry choose the field because they can help people but also to be compensated for their chosen profession.  How many DPT's would work for 25-30,000 a year so others can have health insurance?

Lawyers charge large fees but people still pay them up front before services are rendered and lawyers will stop consulting if you do not pay, how is that different from how health care works?  Dentists charge large fees and they do not guarantee a filling will hold or your teeth will withstand the drill used but people will still pay up front for the service.  

Chiropractors make you pay up front costs to be seen but no one seems to mind this, they can take x-rays (which costs extra), and charge you for consultations and up sell for other products in their office like massage, vitamins, etc.  Where is the outcry about this?

Debra, have you read the article that Janey mentions in the blog? If not, I suggest you do. It is rather enlightening. If you have and feel that it is a misleading or inaccurate depiction of how hospitals charge for things, I would love to hear the evidence to support that argument!

I want to ask specifically about one statement you make though: Medicaid only reimburses 65% of costs. Are you really referring to costs or to charges? Those are two very different concepts and make a huge difference in perception. Thanks.

I am a PTA working on a BS in HealthCare administration. In response to the commplaint that hospitals charge 11times their actual costs, I will say that we should all become familiar with the practice of cost shifting.  Medicaid reimbursements only cover about 65% of provider costs. Medicare is not much better. Most hospitals see a very large number of Medicare patients, they are the "bread and butter" patients. Many hospitals also see a large number of Medicaid patients as well.  Add to that charity and bad debts (people who can not pay the balance fo their bills, understandably), and you have a VERY large number of patients who are receiving care below cost.  How does a hospital or aother provider then meet their expenses, pay their staff, pay for MRI equipment??? They have to shift the cost to those who have private insurance...Blue Cross, Aetna, etc.  So, yes, providers must charge far too much for their services , not to pay their CEO's, but to make up for a large number of low reimbursements from government subsidized third party payers!   Stay tuned, there will be much more of this, yet to come.  Get Educated, People!!!!!

You are absolutely right. The "best" healthcare isn't the system that allows human lives to be sacrificed at the altar of affluence.

I noticed your post after I'd written mine. A friend in healthcare pointed me to this article. Sad statement on our priorities as a nation.

I cited the same article in my blog this week, but with a slightly different take. Also this week I met an old acquaintance who had broken his humerus in a fall. Working as a freelance journalist and making rather little money, he had no healthcare insurance. The ER asked him how he intended to pay and he told them he couldn't. They put him in a sling and sent him on his way. Two months later his medicaid came through and he saw his first orthopaedist last week. The NHS of England is not perfect, but this lack of treatment would never occur there. Healthcare in the UK is a public service, not a "not-for-profit" business. As such, salaries are not exceptional, care is basic, but everyone gets care. This friend of mine would have been treated immediately in that type of system. I can't keep still while I hear people say we have the best healthcare system in the world. We don't. The best healthcare is available here IF YOU CAN PAY FOR IT. That means it is the best health care for only a select few.