Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan Releases Letter Sent to Congressmen John Dingell and Sander Levin
Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan Releases Letter Sent to Congressmen John Dingell and Sander Levin
Some interesting items in the letter. BCBSM does claim to take pre-existing conditions.
( Read more... )
The problem is the insurance industry and the way claims are paid...all the wheeling and dealing that goes on. The "consumer" (patient) can't shop for the best value when seeking medical services, because there is no set rate!
It was suggested I needed a sleep study for sleep apnea (which as we all know I do NOT have)...I called around...it depends who your insurance company is, and what contract you are covered under, because all the rates are different! It is a different rate if you are uninsured/sel-insured...it is different if you are medicare...it is different if you are VA...it is different depending on your plan. and then we have another layer of costs with the doc who reads the results.
Same thing with surgery. The patient has absolutely no idea what it will cost. Surgeon, first surgical assist, OR charge, pathologist, anesthesiologist, drugs, skilled nursing services I, II, III, etc...and on and on.
and for ghod's sake, don't have a coronary bypass...after your $5000 out-of-pocket, anyone here got the 20% of the $445K remaining? I had one of those come across my desk recently.
I've got unemployed people who have let their COBRA coverage lapse, because even with the 65% assistance from the Feds it is still too pricey (eat or pay ins premium...hmmmm).... and now some of those people who have pre-existing conditions and their family members can't get back on a plan.
Insurance companies are in business to make money. OK. I got that. They're betting you won't get sick, you're betting you will. They cherry-pick who they will cover...and the rest get dumped into the risk pool.
There is a basic arcaneness to the way insurance is structured and by gar, they keep us stupid with their mumbo-jumbo... and the high-paid lobbyists that stroke our Congresscritters to pass laws in their favor need to go.
Yes, as talkradio is wont to point out, 85% of people are happy with their health insurance... that's the people that HAVE insurance. That is not the 40 million that do not, and the 22,000 who die every year from lack of health care.
We are being asked to buy an empty box. We do not know what this health care initiative IS... not a clue. Is it a national health plan or should we just be figuring out how to cover those who are without, and then fix it?
BCBS is full of themselves... WI, TX, MI...I've dealt with them all. The HIPAA "privacy laws" aren't helping much either. Hard to get the info needed.
Pretty much like when you couldn't get info on your son's claims because they spelled his first name TREN, and even his mother (whom we can presume was present at the time of birth) couldn't get the info to complete the claim.
Sorry for the length and incongruity, but this crap eats up a lot of my day at work, when I should be screwing off playing on the internet...
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I agree, most insurance plans are painful..did you catch the story yesterday (I think) on CNN re: nurse practitioner who worked for a number of docs that had no insurance coverage and had to mortgage her house to pay for her cancer treatments? If anyone shoould have been able to get help, I would have thought she would. She has started a medical clinic for the uninsured, much to her credit.
I feel guilty because I have excellent coverage, but it should be at $1800/mo. Yes, per month. Single plan. I write the check from my employer, who covers the premium 100%. But I see the discounted bills and I wonder why not everyone gets those prices. Something is seriously wrong with this system.
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