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I agree, it would reduce your friends job to a part time job. You could also not get a full diagnosis from just one test and a confident doctor.



So the patient is just paying a different membership fee to a different person, the doctor just gets more money and screws the insurance company and the patient is now married to this doctor where as with insurance, if he wanted to get a second opinion, with just a co-pay, he could do that easily.



Insurance companies are not 1 person. Not everybody working at insurance companies are evil corporate baby eating demons of the underworld. I much rather have a insurance company with 1,000s of people putting a eye on what could be going wrong vs relying on all doctors to be legit, caring people. I have heard of MANY unscrupulous doctors who make many mistakes, just to move and open another practice else where and repeat... I guess thats what you call PRACTICING medicine. To rely on a doctor or him and his small group of employees at his clinic vs 1,000 people at a insurance company, give me the insurance.


What we need is reform. Simplify the system and make some sort of baser system for health care that encases all facets of the system. When a person on insurance is being charged 100 per syringe and 10 dollars for a simple gauze, it doesn't sound like the hospitals/doctors/clinics are being very caring and makes me worried.

As I said, my friend has since left. Why it would reduce the hours of the job, though, I'm not sure -- there's no shortage of things to do in a medical office, after all.

As for the diagnostic accuracy, you'd be surprised at how much medical experience many doctors have. It's almost like they do that kind of thing every day, y'know? lol

Let me run this by you, though -- Mr. Patient has an HMO. He's naturally reluctant to go to the doctor anyway, but by the time he finally can't macho it out anymore, he's got a fairly advanced and even somewhat debilitating medical problem. Based on his symptoms, his problem could be one of three, maybe four rather different things (I'll call them A, B, C, and D for the moment). Taking into account his diet, exercise, and other lifestyle factors, however, it's extremely unlikely that he's suffering from anything but C.

Logically, the doctor should draw some blood and take whatever other samples are relevant and send them to the lab to confirm that the problem is, in fact, C. And in the meantime, Mr. Patient can take a medication that will help if in fact the problem is C and if not, will do no harm.

However, Mr. Patient's HMO plan doesn't work like that. In order for the tests to be covered at all, Mr. Patient must first be tested for A, and if that's ruled out, he must then be tested for B. That must be ruled out before running the tests to confirm that it's C and beginning treatment. Gods help him if it turns out to be D, because by that point he's been being poked and prodded and getting progressively worse for a good two months or so waiting for the doctor to be given permission to treat him.


The patient is probably paying much less to the concierge doctor than he would be paying for insurance, for one thing. For another, if he's not happy with the treatment he's NOT "married" to the doctor; he can seek a new doctor at his convenience, which also differs greatly from insurance coverage, where switching your primary care physician involves paperwork and time -- and that second opinion, by the way, wouldn't be covered. A person only has one primary care physician, and seeing someone else costs you.


Take the insurance, then, and best wishes to you.

Of course not everyone who works there is evil. However, the underwriting department has a certain procedure to follow, as do all the other departments. Employees who aren't performing well, according to their supervisor, may be fired.

Of course, if you'd rather trust in a sweat shop of community college graduates with hundreds of thousands of patient files nearly identical to yours to be looking out for your health rather than making the effort to find a good, attentive doctor... well, that's entirely up to you. The bottom line is that if your health care isn't important enough to you to seek out a doctor you trust, then honestly, I have to say that you deserve to be ******** by the insurance companies.


$100 per syringe? $10 for gauze? What're you referring to?

Granted, but again, that's why it helps you (or me -- whoever's the patient) to pay attention and to have some rudimentary knowledge of health.

There's a joke that goes, "What d'you call the guy who graduates last in his class from med school?"

"Doctor."

The dude who parely passsed is just as much a doctor as the valedictorian... doesn't hurt to remember that about 75% or more of the men and women who were part of the class at the beginning of med school have dropped out, though.

But the point is that if you don't trust your doctor to know his s**t, then don't go to that doctor. I mean, you can't really say the doc's a tard if you're the one going to him for medical care, y'know?


Not covered. The insurance carrier will often insist that first A must be conclusively ruled out before it'll rubber-stamp the funds to pay for checking for B, which must be ruled out before they'll allow money to be spent on checking for C. IF the insurance company insisted all tests be done at once that'd be fine, but HMOs in particular don't often work like that.


Granted, but you won't be getting reimbursed for a second opinion if you're insured, either. If you're not seen by your primary care physician, your insurance doesn't look at it the same. The second opinion's either not covered at all or a small percentage is covered. PPO plans allow for a little more flexibility, of course, but the copay tends to be higher.


... I could actually tell, to be honest. sweatdrop


I agree, insurance companies should follow the ethics guidelines that're laid out. Hospitals and doctors are constrained by limitations imposed by insurance companies regarding treatment options as well as financial limitations imposed by government funding that impact staffing, equiptment, and so on.

With politicians screaming about their oh-so-exalted knowledge of medical care on the one side and corporate moguls insisting that they, too, have the knowledge and experience to make decisions about individuals' medical care on the other, that doesn't leave the actual physicians much room to work in.


Insurance carriers assign you a primary care physician if you don't pick one, too. Like I said, I'm in no way advocating any politician assuming a medical role. Political science degrees don't indicacte much aside from the ability to kiss babies while stealing their candy.

I could see the logic of insisting that every person have a physician on record, but I was weaned a very long time ago and I don't need the government to wet-nurse me.

Don't you hate that? But I have to admit, it's sometimes a nice, nerdly contest to see who can embed the most quotes without it all falling apart... lol


Not by a long shot.


True, though I really honestly strongly feel that the basis of the idea is very sound and that it is the best of all options I've yet to hear.


A bowl of kush says martial law is declared next year just before election time.


Absolutely. Doesn't mean I'm not going to reach in to grab what I can, of course -- I'm as much a free-market capitalist as the next woman, after all. sweatdrop


Obama yo mama. ******** him and the horse he rode in on.

I take it back, Hillary's not really a horse... ninja

I don't care for the Republican practice of denying the need to distribute resources more evenly among the population, but neither do I much like the Democratic habit of making everyone into marionettes and controlling every aspect of our lives. Honestly, I don't care what the ******** platform is; a politician's a politician, whatever other titles he (or she) tries to go by. Just the fact that any of them are running for president at all means they're not anyone I would trust with the responsibility.


Been too long since I've read it, personally... but I truly think there's the functional difference between financial aid provided to those who struggle to make ends meet and those who keep themselves in poverty so they can get handouts. How to adequately draw the line in between and see that those who need aid receive it... that's not an easy proposition.

Yeah I've got one of the high risk strains I believe. Thanks for letting me know more about it though. I was almost freaking out because to be completely honest I've never heard of it before. Well, no, that's not true, I heard about the vaccine but my mother wouldn't let me get it. shame too, might have prevented the thing altogether.

I think they're actually proposing free health care around here actually. Which would be quite helpful.

If someone creates a great service commodity thing, Yeah it'll take of and they'll have worked hard but in order to profit hugely in the capitalist world you'll eventually have to step on the little guy.



I think all that's McCarthyism. But anyway, I don't know a hell of alot about Communism really, just socialism, so I could tell you more about that but you'd write it off as idealistic bullshit.


Well I don't know who the US is funding and I'm not sure what size anything is really, but two thriving socialist nations are Sweden and Venezuela.




If we never change anything they way we do things will slowly degrade, not only is that bad but sometimes you just have to take a chance on some s**t, I mean the American Indians pulled off something of a socialistic society, they were great until the English came in and killed them.