no it is NOT lacking

it is 100% totally FRACKED UP!!!!

and is at the point that the only fix is to use "The Thermonuclear Option "

but that is not going to happen until "The Thermonuclear Option " is used on CONGRESS

back in the 80's there was NO WAY that the USSR was going to change , but it DID and the wall did come down

In regards to my post.

I forgot to say that the operation did NOT reduce the frequency of urination.

But I try to look at the positives in my life.

Both daughters and grand kids are doing great. :-)

I wonder if the wall came down because there was a financial incentive to do so ?

Oh, when 350+ million people actually exert their actual prerogatives as citizens ... there's actually nothing that 800 people (who call themselves Congressmen, Senator, Justice, Judge, President, Commissioner and so-on) can do about it except to desperately obey.

Believe it or not, "government works." But only when you compel it to do so.

(And I do mean, "peacefully." When you look outside your office window and see 3 million people standing there ... albeit very calmly, and with determination etched upon their faces ... you will do exactly what they tell you to do. (And "the corporations" will be fearfully silent, too.)

At precisely the moment that the German people determined that their city and their country was no longer to be cut-in-half, it wasn't.

I like the way FDR put it: "I agree with you. Now, make me do it."

I read an article in a US paper last year about a man who needed a knee joint replaced. Because he had been treated for a knee injury about 30 years earlier before he joined his current insurer, he wasn't covered. He ended up having the operation done in Belgium. The total cost, including the Atlantic flights, was less than the cost of the joint alone in the US! It seems that all the joint manufacturers in the US just happen to charge the same price... It looks like the medical industry in your country rips off the insurance companies and they just pass on the costs.

I'm no fan of the nationalisation of health care that we have in Britain - I'd prefer the French or German systems. But the one thing we all have (save the Netherlands) is public funding of health care and hence governments who are not going to be ripped off. If you charge too much for your product, it won't get approved, and if you form a cartel, you'll be prosecuted.

In all seriousness and with no disrespect I think you really should research what you call "Obamacare" and see for yourself that it was cut and compromised and still made care better for most US citizens. Just to name one, wiping out precondition exclusion in Insurance is HUGE. There is much more. The push to make doctors more interested in money than patients has evolved over time and no one president has made that so. Healthcare is still awful and much of it has to do with doctors organizing into groups and hiring beancounters to maximize profit (much of that a reaction to the massive cost of Insurance against malpractice) and was not arrived at through government, other than it's cowtowing to Insurance conglommerates and leaving them alone..... until Obama.

Please do find out for yourself who is on your side and who treats you like a mushroom. You won't likely get at the truth if you limit yourself to Fox "News".

I really hate discussing politics, but the Affordable Care Act/Obamacare has done nothing to benefit anyone ... except buying votes for the presidency. Other than that, insurance deductibles have quadrupled, premiums have gone up. Sure more people are covered, but most do NOT have access to healthcare, because nothing was done about that. Obama said taxes would not increase, and yet new taxes have been introduced to pay for it (ex. taxes on landlords at least in Virginia). Extra burden has been put on doctors, who will now be responsible for non-compliant patients, and cannot avoid them.

Go ahead and blame greedy doctors, because that's the only people you meet eye to eye. Ignore the fact that doctor's salaries have been decreasing compared to all other professions (accounting for inflation). Ignore the fact that the most profitable industries in the US are pharmaceuticals and medical devices, where the sky is the limit for prices.

Oncologists Speak Out Against the High Cost of Cancer Drugs
http://www.ascopost.com/issues/june-...ug-prices.aspx
http://www.ascopost.com/issues/augus...cer-drugs.aspx

Douchebag Pharma CEO Raises Drug Price 5000% Because Screw Your Sick Baby
http://wonkette.com/594159/douchebag...your-sick-baby

http://faculty.tamucc.edu/sfriday/wordpress/?p=2341

You really want to lower healthcare costs ?
1) Stop filing frivolous lawsuits against doctors because they make more than you do and you want some of it. It only increases your costs.
2) Stand up and tell the gov't to put price caps on essential pharmaceuticals and medical devices. Otherwise the CEO sets the price to whatever number comes into their head.
3) If you are not receiving required medical care because your insurance does not cover it, complain to the insurance about it. The insurance companies are basically middle men that take from you and try their best to keep it and not give it to the doctors treating you. Again, I've seen many doctors pay for their patients' procedures because they were not willing to let the patient die because the insurance would not pay for the procedure. There are also plenty of not-for-profit hospitals that will help you finance your medical needs.

All?

Check the last linked article, maybe not 100%, but most.

just in case I wasn't perfectly clear, I for one do not blame doctors nor think they are especially greedy. If it was solely about money there are easier ways than becoming and being a physician, and most have considerable more autonomy than present day doctors have. I blame Insurance and Pharmaceutical companies and a few oddball special interest groups with a misguided sense of "Public Good".

However although I don't yet have hard numbers I do consider the Preconditions clause to be huge escape clause for Insurance companies and cannot but imagine that even limiting it it has great benefits to those with pockets (and influence) not so deep as those corporations, which is damned near everybody.

Metaschima's post about the poor US doctors who only get to take home $151,000 to $226,000 sent me to check what the NHS pays in Britain. I discovered this:
Consultant is the top grade in hospitals. The pay is, of course, pre-tax: the £101,451 would actually mean £65,877 to take home: less than half what they'd get in the US.

However ...

"As an Oncologist, you are a member of the staff of The For-Profit Hospital Corporation ('The Company') who has the legal right to Give Diagnoses and to Write Prescriptions."

"Realize that you have no realistic options for employment outside of The Company ... and that you have hundreds of thousands of student loans to pay."

"Our actuaries have calculated that a Cancer diagnosis is worth about $85,000 between the time that the diagnosis is rendered and the time that the patient dies. The Revenue Management department can calculate the proft potential of any particular case." Therefore:

• You are to render the most profitable diagnosis for any particular patient case, after confirming this with Revenue Management.
• Your treatment plan must be the most profitable one for each case, as determined by Revenue Management.
  • Patients who are less-seriously ill must be "strung along," as far as their (For-Profit) Insurance Companies will permit, and you are obliged to give said Insurance Companies glowing reports.
  • Patients in "prognostication percentiles" less than 50% are not to be afforded access to any Expensive Treatments which (a) might not be reimbursed, and in general (b) will keep these people 'on the books' longer than p-r-o-f-i-t-a-b-l-y necessary."

Remember: you are an employee of The Company, and you have bills to pay and you have nowhere else to go. And, you work for The Company which is: f-o-r P-R-O-F-I-T. Therefore, do not have any silly notions about "patient care." These "patients" are merely our revenue sources. (We call them, "units.") Fate will provide us with an endless supply of them, and our Business Model is to extract the maximum amount of Revenue from each one.

You, "Doctor," are just a Cog in that Wheel.

The Company pays hundreds of millions of dollars a month to Senators, Congressmen, Justices, Judges, Presidents, and Commissioners ... so ... "there's nothing you can do, Doctor ... nothing the American People can do, Doctor ... our Corporation is a 'citizen' just like they are, Doctor ... no, there's nothing that 318,86 million people can do, Doctor ... it must be this way, Doctor ... you are getting sleepy, very sleepy ..."

Go ahead. Write a letter to your Senator. For every one you write, I'll write another one for The Company with a $10,000 "contribution" check in it. We'll see which one (s)he reads. "Bwahahahahahahaha!!!"

---
(The man in the black hat (and the stethoscope ...) reared his horse back, defiantly and confidently. But, looking beyond him, did I see a whisper of dust on the horizon? ...)

@sundialsvcs

Taking up writing fiction?

Ahh, I wish I were. Unfortunately, I've had too many hospital clients.

I also lost an uncle to a C. Diff infection because his insurance company would not pay for the antibiotic that can actually stop that infection.

And then, I almost lost my father to exactly the same thing. The drug cost $800. We walked into Revenue Management at the hospital with a certified check. The Revenue Management person then called the doctor and authorized him to administer the drug, which is also what the physician had originally ordered. My father survived.

Yes, at the present state of affairs, this is how the medical industry thinks. This is also how the insurance companies think. Notice also how these two industries are in opposition: hospitals want to make profits, but they get those profits from insurance companies who also want to make profits. Where does the patient fit into all of this? Nowhere.

You are "a unit." (Literally. That's what they call you in the office.)

This is not a work of fiction. It is also not a tolerable state of affairs for "medical care in the United States." And the very first thing that must be done is: "to refuse to tolerate it anymore." It is impossible to provide 'health care' for 'profit!'

Well, it's too bad your family had a bad experience. I read your earlier post too. I sympathize. Really, sorry for your loss and no sarcasm. Anyone who reads any of your posts here at LQ knows you are sincere and want to help people. We all I'm sure wish things were different.

However I don't think that anyone is saying "Bwahahahahahahaha!!!" outside of Saturday morning cartoons... Demonizing one group of stakeholders or oversimplifying the situation isn't any better here than it is in talking about systemd. People have different points of view: nobody sits around thinking like your fictional characters. They're just people, like you and I.

Your earlier suggestion that all doctors be on salary generously picked by (someone) sounds like it would be very unpopular in any profession. How exactly would that be implemented? You run your own company, do you not? Why limit your suggestion to doctors? Why not everyone? Salary scales for everyone, transparently available to all! We could all be part of the government civil service. No one would like that.

It isn't a solution because it doesn't fit human nature. Change human nature.