Took another double broadside yesterday folks. Seems there wasn't any improvement in my blogging at all. According to the same critics who took me apart on Wednesday. But, I'm not quite ready to blog off for good yet.
Today, I'd like to put forth a theory I have, and think about all the time. It regards health care and what the administration is trying to do by overhauling it.
From a patient's point of view, and I have considerable experience here, along with input I get from others discussing the issue, I think there's little doubt that the U.S. has the best medical system in the world. I mean, I don't hear about a lot of Americans trying to sneak into Canada or Mexico for medical care.
Boiling it down, I really think the problem is that the administration is going after the wrong profession. It's not the medical system that needs to be fixed, it's the legal profession that sucks.
Shakespeare said it about 400 years ago in King Henry VI with the line "Lets kill all the lawyers". And, he certainly was right. Many doctors today have to work for eight or nine months just to cover the cost of their malpractice insurance. Why? Because some attorneys are waiting like sharks to smell the blood of a misdiagnosis or mistreatment. Then they jump right in to handle the case or add the injured party to some massive class action suit. Then, when there's a final adjudication, the injured party walks away with a couple of bucks and the attorney takes his huge windfall, finances a campaign and tries to become President of the United States.
So, no wonder medical care is so expensive. If someone has a hangnail and seeks medical attention, doctors no longer immediately treat the problem. They order a series of tests and gather additional information. Such as, lab reports, second opinions, and major consultations. Not necessarily because any of that stuff is really needed, but to avoid a lawsuit if they're deemed to have misdiagnosed or overlooked something along the way. And, every single one of these unnecessary tests and procedures costs money. Thus, if the original hangnail could have been remedied for fifteen bucks, by the time all the tests and whatever are tacked on, the case costs four hundred dollars. Multiply that by the thousands and thousands of people treated every day and the total cost becomes immense.
That's a lot different then it used to be when all doctors had to worry about was helping patients get better. The late, great Henny Youngman told of a man who went to see his doctor. When asked what was wrong, the patient raised his arm all the way and said, "It hurts when I go like that. What do you think?" The doctor replied, "OK, don't go like that. That'll be ten dollars." Today, that doctor would likely lose his license.
That's it for today folks. See you later.
Adios
I know you don't like to write about politics. But I saw this blog on what countries Americans like (http://www.gloria-center.org/gloria/2010/03/americans-love-israel). What I find interesting is that 85% of Republicans have a very favorable view of Israel but only 48% of Democrats do. So could you explain to me again why 80% of Jewish voters vote Democratic??????
ReplyDeleteReply to Yanks2010.
ReplyDeleteThe answer to that is a little out of my depth, but I think the it stems back to FDR. The Roosevelt administration was very favorable to Jews, and very strong bonds were created to the Democrat party. Through the years that relationship has held and is obviously still very much in place.
On the other hand,Jimmy Carter was no friend of Israel or American Jews when he was in office, and still isn't today. And the Clintons, especially Hillary, were extremely close to Yasir Arafat and his wife and met with them quite often. Yet I don't recall any particular friendship between the Clintons and Israel.
On the other hand, both Bush's, Herbert Walker and W, were very close to Israel as well as to American Jews. Steps taken like the Gulf War and the war in Iraq are as much protective of Israel as they are anything else.
Lastly, the current administration doesn't seem in any way supportive of Israel or American Jews. As I recall, the Reverand Wright ranted and railed against both during the Presidential campaign, til they somehow hid him away somewhere.
So, you've asked a very good question -the answer beats the hell of me.
Well as far as medical care, you are right, with the exception of some people traveling to Europe or China for the aggressive therapies or experiments that aren’t legal in US - So, I guess that explains that. But as far as medical ‘professionals’ in the US, some of them have actually gone to Mexico to get their degrees and pay an excessive amount of money to have them approved here in the US, maybe that why it’s so expensive to get care in the US or the costs to bail them out of those Mexican prisons they were jailed in for losing the Mexican chief of police in the operating table.
ReplyDeleteBut seriously, you forgot one terribly flawed system in the US and that is our friend the financial system. The very systems they put in place time and time again create the need for them later to change those systems, destroy the economy by not lending because the new SCORING systems don’t allow it, and then shutting those systems down again so they can lend money, and then having to turn them on again because the system.
And we go round and round and round – Like your example of the windfall coming full circle to the lawyers, the very institutions that approved a loan officers structure of a 120% Loan-to-Value Pay Option Arm for a fixed income ex-grocery clerk in Alabama, who now is in foreclosure because they can’t afford the payments that have now adjusted to full PITI because they have reached the 105% neg-am ceiling and the “modification” offered by the bank does not do a thing for them either, and my tax dollars bailed out the very bank that created their situation by approving this silly loan– and yes the borrower is not at fault in this case because they as a grocery clerk in Alabama (I don’t mean this the wrong way) didn’t know what they were getting into – now they have been evicted, their house was sold at auction, and it ruined the value of their neighbors house, who by the way is paying their mortgage fine and wants to refinance, but they can’t because the sales comps in the neighborhood from all the foreclosure sales have dragged the prices down, so now in few months because they can’t re-finance may have issues too… and so on and so on and so on.