Here's my health care proposal:

[rzemanfl]

Give people an income tax deduction for the what the health care providers billed, not what they or their insurance company paid. By that standard my taxable income last year would be three or four thousand tops.

[NC_Nurse]

1. How about prices are regulated and have to be posted publicy...

One price for every customer - with or without insurance. That would change a lot of things.
Then we could decide how to proceed from there.

[Warren Stupidity]

2. How about we just extend medicare to everyone

and cut the profit right out of the health insurance industry? This could be implemented in a matter of weeks.

[Warpy]

3. Part of the problem is that nobody knows what stuff really costs now

How much does it cost to have 1/6 of a nurse's time over 12 hours? What does inserting an IV line cost? What does an Xray actually cost in terms of operation by a skilled tech, maintenance, and depreciation? How about delivery of a pill in terms of having the order written and checked for allergy and interaction by a pharmacist and interference with body systems by a nurse who has to know what lab values and vital signs mean?

Diseases are paid a flat rate according to a computer model of what the average person has done during the course of that disease. How many of us fit the average model?

Damned few.

People who fall outside the model at the expensive end will find themselves billed for overcharges. People who fall outside it at the cheap end will contribute to the profits of the insurance company and the hospital. That's one of the ways they make money.

The net result is that nobody actually knows what health care really costs. The whole system needs to be rebuilt from the ground up, the core philosophy changed, and the delivery of appropriate care the highest priority.

Once that is done and the costs are totted up, we'll know how much a sliding scale single payer plan will cost us all.

[rzemanfl]

6. I got billed for over $18,000 for my doc's use of lithotripsy

equipment to break up one kidney stone in December. I understand that takes about twenty minutes.
Those machines cost about as much as a McMansion, but still....

[Warpy]

8. The machines cost as much as a McMansion

and have to be replaced every few years. Plus, you were paying for the expertise of knowing where the stone was and whether or not it was a type that would respond to lithotrypsy.

Consider the expense of hospitalization and surgery to remove it.

Still, that cost is inflated. The insurance company wouldn't pay that much for it and neither should you. Ask about a discount for the uninsured.

I always get one.

[rzemanfl]

9. I thought my doctor aimed the thing. My insurance company

paid nothing near that amount. I had lithotripsy (there seems to be two schools of thought on "i" vs. "y") 11 years ago, back when you were immersed in water for the procedure, the charge was less than a third as much and I didn't get a huge bruise like this procedure left. These outrageous charges are a scam, the insurance company pretends to hold down costs and the docs and medical facilities pretend to be underpaid.

[LWolf]

4. My solution: HR 676. nt

[RB TexLa]

5. And let people see how much health care providers try to steal from the insurance companies?

Yeah, doctors and hospitals are going to let that happen. :rofl:

[rzemanfl]

7. It's all a dog and pony show. The insurance companies pretend

to hold down costs and the docs and hospitals pretend to be underpaid. There is plenty of profit for everybody on the other side of the dog shit and horse manure.