Craftygal died Wednesday night....but...

[RicROC]

32. US healthcare is evolving..

the doctors in the Rochester, NY area who forever resisted 'socialized medicine' have had their private practices bought up by the two main hospital systems and now work as salaried employees. I'm not sure this evolves into a better health care for the patients, but it shows that evolution can happen in a short time.

One negative aspect is that if patient wishes to change care from doctor to another doctor, they are prevented/highly discouraged from doing so if the new doctor is within that particular hospital system, so the alternative is to search within the other system. Hence, patient control is forfeited or highly restricted.

In my case, I wanted to change cardiologists but was told I could not because they were both within their system (and not even in the same office) , until the office manager, who is savvy with insurance law, found out that if had been 3 years since my last appointment, therefore, they would file my claim as a new patient (and the old doctor would never find out).