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TURNING POINT

How to Mend a Sick System

A politician learns firsthand the need for health-care reform.

NEWSWEEK
Oct 29, 2007 Issue

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  • Posted By: bill3610@hotmail.com @ 12/02/2007 12:36:32 PM

    Comment: I am a teacher in West Virginia and have PEIA insurance, yes having insurance is great and I am lucking that most of my costs have been covered. But after the treatment I received in West Virginia, my wife and I decided that it would be to our benefit to go to West Penn Hospital in Pittsburgh. The doctors in Pittsburgh have extensive backgroung dealing with Multple Myelomia and the best treatment options. Well, my insurance company want to charge me $10,000.00 because I am going out of their loop and attempting to get the best treatmenta available. So, eventhough you have insurance coverage you don't always get the opurtunity for the best care. Of cource I'll find a way to be able to pay the extra penalty.

  • Posted By: csedgewood @ 11/08/2007 1:47:41 AM

    Comment: I don't understand why the drug companies would be upset with Universal Health Care. People would be living longer and healthier lives, because more of the population would be using their drugs, and they would realize the profit from longer usage and more usage. It would also be less costly to the populace. It would be an initial outlay up front for a few years, but cost effective after that. The doctors should be happy; they'd be seeing more patients, more often, at a profit for them also.

  • Posted By: bikingmary15 @ 11/07/2007 9:45:30 AM

    Comment: The answer to the health care problem is embedded in Geraldine Ferraro???s article and her statement...."People who have insurance....get the treatment they need". The solutions do not lie in government run health care systems....ask anyone on Medicare or Medicaid if they happy with their coverage. The solutions lie in everyone having medical insurance.
    The government needs to regulate insurance companies and mandate that insurance coverage cannot be denied. Insurance companies simply need to spread the high risk individuals across the various companies, and everyone will still make money! Health care insurance should not be tied to employment???..one should be insured because you are a citizen of the United States, period! Government might help purchase insurance coverage for the very poor of our citizens.
    Government should also regulate pharmaceutical companies as well as companies that produce health care equipment. Price controls or laws that mandate ethical mark-ups of profit on a product or drug are necessary. A drug or product sold in Canada, Mexico or USA should have similar costs!

  • Posted By: whattheheck60 @ 11/05/2007 9:26:18 AM

    Comment: i will not be a part of a national health system. it will cost to much and will create waiting list for treatment. Just ask a canadian i have a friend who pays 55% of his wages to the government to run their so call free national heath it all a lie ,a lie, a lie. Don't vote for anyone who support any kind of nation health system.

  • Posted By: diverdonreed @ 10/28/2007 7:20:14 PM

    Comment: Cancer has a stem cell basis, and it will take stem cell therapies to cure it. It is time we removed the religious and ideological constraints on the research. Science is our only hope for cure-- so that people like my sister can live without fear again. She has had the operations, had the chemo, and she is hanging on-- but I want her well. If a person, like President Bush, is against embryonic stem cell research, then let him refuse treatment for himself-- but he does not have the right to block my family from medical care..

  • Posted By: diverdonreed @ 10/28/2007 7:15:13 PM

    Comment: Time to remove the ideological restrictions on stem cell research! Both embryonic and Somatic Cell Nuclear Transfer (SCNT) research needs to be funded-- too many people suffering without the hope of cure.

  • Posted By: Greedy Doc @ 10/26/2007 11:52:06 PM

    Comment: I'm an Internist. For the uninitiated I'm a 'pediatrician for adults'. I was born and raised in this country, I love the USA and it's citizens, and treaed them with respect and care.
    I'm sorry to hear about Ms Ferraro's ilness and hope she does well. Unfortunately I see this issue several times daily. Hard as it is for me to believe, I've been in practice more than twenty years. I've seen the genesis of lots of the current Tom-foolery and I can tell you Health care IS facing a crisis and it WILL er IS getting worse. Anyone interested in seeing an accurate discussion of the issue read "Who Killed Healthcare" by Regina Herzlinger. I've never met her but she makes sense; Clearly nothing will come of her suggestions...

    I pride myself in being a patient advocate; but also can't tolerate waste in healthcare. Like many good physicians, I try to balance my patient's welfare with efficient use of healthcare $. More often it is the system shafting patients than vice versa. My staff now smiles when they hear me cuss out (no 4 letter words) a Pharmacy benefits manager, or even a physician who has joined the 'dark side' of insurance by denying care to deserving patients... I saw and examined the patient; have years of training and experience; I don't know what I'm doing?? It happens more than daily.

    Here's an earthshaking idea: let's remove the 'third party payor' system in which the insuree pays an exorbitant amount for insurance in return for reimbursements that are a fraction of the value for the Physicians service; and let the patient decide if the care of the physician is worth the charge, Pay the provider if it is worthy and then let the purchaser of insurance determine if they are getting value from their insurer or Pharmaceutical Company.

    Interestingly Capitalism still works, only slowly... back in the 80's I was told by the HMO's that if I didn't like what they were doing, vote with my feet. It was already too late for me; I'd spent half my life training to be an Internist and couldn't go back now.

    Now, however, what few medical students will even train in Internal Medicine won't become General Internists, but Cardiologists, Pulmonologists, etc. So just as Baby boomers reach the need for an Internist; we won't exist. I am sorry for the public but I do my best for my patients every day. That's all I can do now... and try to keep my doors open skipping paychecks,
    The ball is in the patient's court. There are 2,000 or more of you for every one of me. It has become the responsibility of citizens to vote and make the decisions that business is too greedy to make. And government officials too cold-footed to make (Ms Ferraro?). They've never listened to me or other Docs.

    Will you save me like I've saved so many of you??? Sign me "Greedy Doctor"

  • Posted By: anncrooks @ 10/26/2007 2:11:28 PM

    Comment: I know how devastling an illness can affect a family. Ours has not only been affected emotionally, but financially. We have paid out of pocket more than 6 figures for our child with a severe disease ( and we do have health insurance) . Luckily, we both work, have little debt and at the time had some savings. Now with 3 teenagers, we are also lucky to all be alive and still able to afford some things, but we have a lot more debt than ever before. Hopefully, if we both remain employed we will still be able to send our children to college.

  • Posted By: FATJOEY @ 10/26/2007 12:48:02 PM

    Comment: FORGET "UNIVERSAL COVERAGE", REGULATE THE DOCTORS AND HOSPITOLS!! $1K A DAY FOR A SEMI PRIVATE ROOM AND $25 FOR AN ADVIL IS AN OUTRAGE!!!

  • Posted By: jmh268 @ 10/25/2007 5:10:19 PM

    Comment: So how do we address this issue, which is a fundamental conflict between a market based healthcare system and a fundamental right for the healthcare that system provides. The market would provide prices of products where the supply of a drug or treatment meets the demand, which of course alienates some. What results is that those who value the drug (and have the resources) like Ms. Ferraro will pay out whatever it takes to get it. Those who do not have the resources cannot. This is the shameful part.

    If healthcare is a right, how does the culture react to that. First, gov't regulates the pricing of drugs, which in turn impacts drug manufacturers. Of course, treatments are not only drug related but doctor related, so the gov't must regulate physicians' pricing. How far are those in DC willing to go? Regulation across the board will result in market reactions, mainly investment in pharma, biotech, etc. Gov't funding will have to be used to support the needed research, gov't will dictate where funding will go, as well as what should be researched.

    I am interested in what the plan is... how do we get to the fundamental right of healthcare, while in a market system. Phased approach, subsidies, gov't complete intervention?

  • Posted By: advocate @ 10/24/2007 8:51:20 PM

    Comment: Cool Robo - Your true to your neo-con roots of mocking the afflicted. Well, not surprising since your kinds parodid someone afflicted withe parkinson's. Another mocked a sick child because the family happened to advocate expanding SCHIP.

    What else cesspool you and your kind swim on?

  • Posted By: lotionless @ 10/24/2007 5:52:47 PM

    Comment: Let me begin by saying that I am a physician. My main issue is that Americans do not take care of themselves. They engage in bad eating habits (obesity), bad social habits (smoking and excessive drinking, not to mention texting while driving) and risky activities (motercycling, dune buggying, running red lights). It never ceases to amaze me that the person comming to the operating room with a fracture is the guy with a dune buggy and no insurance, or the pregnant smoker in labor with a cell phone and a video camera but no insurance. Let us stop taking care of these patients so that we can help the people with cancer. People have their priorities all screwed up. Mandatory out of pocket insurance just like mandatory automobile liability insurance for everyone.

  • Posted By: wilednyne @ 10/24/2007 12:06:06 PM

    Comment: Everyone for universal health care coverage, please provide the United States government with every bank account and routing number you have so that it can remove funds at will. I love all this talk about entitlements, but WHERE ARE WE GOING TO GET THE MONEY FOR THEM? Oh, here is the solution, let's just fvck the middle class again raise taxes to support people's bad choices. Thank god we will eventually live in a socialist state where everything is an entitlement and guaranteed by the Constitution. Let's just forget about accountability and taking responsibility for your own actions. We have the United States government to take care of us. Thank you Jesus, Mohammed, Allah, Buddha, Siddartha, Satan, Yahweh, etc. for blessing us with such a great government.

    • Posted By: thanson123 @ 10/24/2007 18:16:35

      Comment: You know what else I find interesting, the ones who complain the most about the health care systems in Canada, the UK, France etc. are the Americans. The citizens of Canada, the UK, France etc. love their health care system. And really what's the big deal wilednyne, all we have to do is cut taxes more, and the revenues will come flooding into the government easily providing enough money to provide health care to every US citizen.

  • Posted By: thanson123 @ 10/24/2007 10:49:40 AM

    Comment: The crassness of some people! What do the rights of the unborn, have to do with being diagnosed with a life threatening cancer. It never ceases to amaze me, how much compassion some people have for the unborn, and how little compassion they have for the living.

  • Posted By: steveh46 @ 10/23/2007 4:13:22 PM

    Comment: Always good to see the compassionate conservatives come out and savage someone for getting cancer. Keep it up, it shows just what kind of people you are.

  • Posted By: robo1415 @ 10/23/2007 4:05:22 PM

    Comment: I would also like to know if you would give up your hefty Congressinal pension and help out the long-suffering taxpayer?After all,you are not an impovershed woman...

  • Posted By: robo1415 @ 10/23/2007 4:01:11 PM

    Comment: I would hope that Mrs.Ferraro's battle with life-taking cancer makes her rethink her bigotry and intolerance toward the lives of the unborn that she is most famous for...Time to jettison the Fetaphobia,Geraldine...

  • Posted By: gung-ho_1221 @ 10/22/2007 6:11:50 PM

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