Someday I fear health insurance will be a thing of the past.

[Dr_Finkelstein]

The rankings are misleading because they take into account those who do not have private health insurance. My privately funded health care beats any publicly funded health care hands down in terms of cost, wait times and coverage. You want proof? Just look at the number of foreigners who come here for their emergency medical needs.

For emergency medical care? I highly doubt it, for some very, very specialised treatments only available in the US, and non emergency health needs, yes very possibly. In the UK certainly (and I imagine in the rest of Europe and Canada) if you get knocked down by a bus then you don't go to a Private Hosp (they wouldn't take you) - the ambulance will take you to your nearest NHS A&E. The emergency care in the UK rates as well as anywhere in the world, incl the US.

For non emergency treatments (hip replacements, scans for back pain etc) yes, there can be a wait, considerable at times. This is where there is room for improvement in the NHS. Those who can afford it, may well choose to use Private health care for these issues - Private healthcare in the UK will only do scheduled, fairly routine procedures; any complications develop, or things go wrong they then ship them off to the nearest NHS hospital to deal with. They won't touch anything complicated, or likely to become so - they'll start to lose money.

In the UK, if cancer is suspected then referral to specialist diagnosis/treatment must be done within 2 weeks. In my experience, diagnostic tests often start within 24-48 hours.

Di x

 

[sasywtch]

According to this report it takes roughly 2-4 weeks to get a mammogram in Canada.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/health/story/2009/05/07/breast-cancer-early-diagnosis-gattuso.html

At the end of the article it talks about "the policy makers" and "if it wasn't for the donation". That's what I don't want. I don't want my government deciding for me on medical issues. There is another issue regarding taxes that I won't go into for fear of being against the board's policy.

Here in CA, I walk in Monday-Friday once a year for a mammogram, free (minus the $100 I pay monthly). If the radiologist sees something "odd", I am sent to the ultrasound that day.

2002, I went in for a mammogram on Tuesday, Friday I was seeing a surgeon and on the following Tuesday I was having surgery.

Wednesday, I have my yearly checkup and will probably do a walkin that day for the mammogram and the walkin for the flu shot.

I realize it's not like that for everyone, same with my daughter who has a blue collar type job, no insurance. I would love to see a program for those who want or need socialized type insurance for cheaper and those who want to keep what they have. No offense to anyone but years ago with my divorce, I went on the state medical until I could go back to work and waited 4 hours at the doctor's office, felt like a number, had no choice who I saw in the large practice. With the dental, pulling the teeth was cheaper so that's the route they went instead of doing a root canal. That was the government's involvement. If XYZ is the diagnosis, you can only do plan A.

I'm not for or against as I know my mom's family has gotten excellent care in England and just had to wait for elective surgery but I also know their taxes were through the roof.

 

[angwill]

At the end of the article it talks about "the policy makers" and "if it wasn't for the donation". That's what I don't want. I don't want my government deciding for me on medical issues. There is another issue regarding taxes that I won't go into for fear of being against the board's policy.

Here in CA, I walk in Monday-Friday once a year for a mammogram, free (minus the $100 I pay monthly). If the radiologist sees something "odd", I am sent to the ultrasound that day.

2002, I went in for a mammogram on Tuesday, Friday I was seeing a surgeon and on the following Tuesday I was having surgery.

Wednesday, I have my yearly checkup and will probably do a walkin that day for the mammogram and the walkin for the flu shot.

I realize it's not like that for everyone, same with my daughter who has a blue collar type job, no insurance. I would love to see a program for those who want or need socialized type insurance for cheaper and those who want to keep what they have. No offense to anyone but years ago with my divorce, I went on the state medical until I could go back to work and waited 4 hours at the doctor's office, felt like a number, had no choice who I saw in the large practice. With the dental, pulling the teeth was cheaper so that's the route they went instead of doing a root canal. That was the government's involvement. If XYZ is the diagnosis, you can only do plan A.

I'm not for or against as I know my mom's family has gotten excellent care in England and just had to wait for elective surgery but I also know their taxes were through the roof.

I can tell you that your experience with medicaid is something that varies all over. I have done foster care with kids on Medicaid and they got the same care with the same wait times I did with private insurance. Doctors office or hospital it all depended on how busy they were on that day at that time and at the ER depends on who is most serious. As long as a doctor is associated with a not for profit hospital here and are accepting patients they have to take medicaid patients. As for dental it all depends on the dentist and how they practice. Once by ignorance I took a kid to a dental factory with dozens of dentists to have them do as much work as they could needed or not for the money. No other time had a dentist done uneeded or inexpensive work.

Now we did have an experience with a pharmacy that would take fill all private insurance patients meds before the medicaid patients if you waited but that was what the people working there chose to do.

I also read an article that it is the same with universal health care and depended on how busy the hospital/doctor was with how long you wait.

I can also speak from working in an OB department with a mix of both private and medicaid patients that the only difference was that the comfort items like a sitzbath or a donut etc were items that were pushed on private patients needed or not because private insurance paid for them yet we were told not to give them to medicaid patients needed or not because the state didn't pay for luxury items and the hospital would have to eat the cost.

 

[Tink-aholic]

According to this report it takes roughly 2-4 weeks to get a mammogram in Canada.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/health/story/2009/05/07/breast-cancer-early-diagnosis-gattuso.html

All I know is that my friend, who lives in a suburb of Toronto (the largest city in the entire country) was told to wait and had to literally pull government strings and got a mammogram based on the decades of service to the country. Otherwise, we were going to book one here and pay out of pocket.

I know that my friend was terrified and wasn't lying. Would a health story published by CBC News be accurate? What is your own experience?

Regardless, 2-4 weeks is too long, particularly since you could either have peace of mind knowing that it is benign for that entire time or you could be recovering from the surgery that removed it.

 

[angwill]

All I know is that my friend, who lives in a suburb of Toronto (the largest city in the entire country) was told to wait and had to literally pull government strings and got a mammogram based on the decades of service to the country. Otherwise, we were going to book one here and pay out of pocket.

I know that my friend was terrified and wasn't lying. Would a health story published by CBC News be accurate? What is your own experience?

Regardless, 2-4 weeks is too long, particularly since you could either have peace of mind knowing that it is benign for that entire time or you could be recovering from the surgery that removed it.

It sounds like your friends issue may have been because she was in Toronto which has a larger population and thererfore more people waiting for care. Compare it to a large city vs small town in the US. I have lived in both and waited longer for ER as well as follow up care in the city than I ever did in the small town. I could be wrong but I am sure someone living in Canada would know best.

 

[CdnCarrie]

All I know is that my friend, who lives in a suburb of Toronto (the largest city in the entire country) was told to wait and had to literally pull government strings and got a mammogram based on the decades of service to the country. Otherwise, we were going to book one here and pay out of pocket.

I know that my friend was terrified and wasn't lying. Would a health story published by CBC News be accurate? What is your own experience?

Regardless, 2-4 weeks is too long, particularly since you could either have peace of mind knowing that it is benign for that entire time or you could be recovering from the surgery that removed it.

http://www.canhealth.com/News761.ht...w days to get an urgent mammogram in toronto.

 

[nunzia]

So all of us who have already stated in this thread that we are satisfied with our socialized medicare are lying. Only YOU know our true feelings? Are you calling us liars?

Even through France\s medical system is rated the best in the world with the U.S. at #37 (below Canada by the way) your ego is too large to admit
socialized medicine does work? How do so many socialized medical systems beat out the U.S. in rankings if they are not working? Where is your factual proof to back up your very absurd accusations?

I have no opinions on other countries and their socialized medicine and attacks really aren't productive or even valid, since the US is not at all like other countries in many many ways, so what does or doesn't work in them is not applicable to the US..we are totally different politcally and organically and our population so far outnumbers other countries that our challenges will always be greater. IMO we are struggling for our identity as to what kind of country we want to be, and that is the root of all discussions going on in the US. Holy cow..healthcare here IS a mess..I agree..but it's something we all need to discuss rationally if we ever hope to get anything done. I don't see much rational talking going on among our leaders, but hopefully a reasonable compromise can be reached at some point, but I'm not super optimistic about that.

 

[mrsklamc]

Perhaps insurance companies should have to operate as non-profits.

 

[eliza61]

The rankings are misleading because they take into account those who do not have private health insurance. My privately funded health care beats any publicly funded health care hands down in terms of cost, wait times and coverage. You want proof? Just look at the number of foreigners who come here for their emergency medical needs.

No you look at the number of foreigners coming here. If you would actually take time to investigate you would see that there is NOT some big foreign influx for medical treatment.

Really, I'm interesting on where you get this information of 10's of thousands of Europeans flooding to america?

I hate to ask this but do you have some thing I can read? Seriously I hear this mantra day in and day out and Now I recognize I don't know a lot of people but as my husband is European and we have spent decades both here and abroud, I've yet to meet or hear these millions upon millions who come here.

Whats interesting is that one report I read was that about 85K Canadians come to the states for medical treatment while 150K Americans go abroad for medical treatment. LOL This was from the AMA
In fact, the trend has been with foreign dignitaries to go to Europe Not america when being treated.
But we do have documented numbers of people in this country that do not make it due to lack of insurance. and in this country insurance directly determines the quality of care.

In fact the growing trend with seniors are the "medical" vacations to South american countries for very good care and 1/4 of the price. It's called medical tourism
http://www.health-tourism.com/medical-tourism/usa-research/

http://www.ama-assn.org/ama1/pub/upload/mm/372/a-08cms1.pdf

There also seems to be a growing trend of cancer patients leaving the country to get other types of treatments.

http://www.news-medical.net/news/20...vasive-gentler-treatments-outside-the-US.aspx

Now I have heard of people from third world countries Africa, Afgahnistan, Hatia, India coming here via charitable orginizations for treatment.


This was a serious question, not being snarky.

You did give a very good point though Disneysix, you are blessed because you have medical insurance. But it seems to me you are saying since you have insurance, the hell with every one else.

No one is saying that socialized medicine is the answer but what we know for a lead pipe fact is that what we have now is absolutely horrible. You know having the supposedly best medicine in the world is only good if people can get it.

 

[canadianjovigirl]

All I know is that my friend, who lives in a suburb of Toronto (the largest city in the entire country) was told to wait and had to literally pull government strings and got a mammogram based on the decades of service to the country. Otherwise, we were going to book one here and pay out of pocket.

I know that my friend was terrified and wasn't lying. Would a health story published by CBC News be accurate? What is your own experience?

Regardless, 2-4 weeks is too long, particularly since you could either have peace of mind knowing that it is benign for that entire time or you could be recovering from the surgery that removed it.

Wow that is shocking as i know 2 women who are battling breast cancer. Kathy went to the Drs in Dec and within 10 days had a mamagram as well as a bone scan and Jan 6 she had her surgery and has just finished her chemo/radiation a month ago so it moved fairly quickly for her (she would have preferred it all done the same day i'm sure)

Another woman from my sons football team, had the same experience. Within a month of her drs appt she had had tests and surgery and started treatment.

So sorry your girlfriend was told she would have to wait as that would have been excruciating. But my experience in Calgary over the last year has not been like that.

 

[eliza61]

. IMO we are struggling for our identity as to what kind of country we want to be, and that is the root of all discussions going on in the US. Holy cow..healthcare here IS a mess..I agree..but it's something we all need to discuss rationally if we ever hope to get anything done. I don't see much rational talking going on among our leaders, but hopefully a reasonable compromise can be reached at some point, but I'm not super optimistic about that.

Because there is no rational discussing amongst people. It is extremely frustrating. I don't know when Americans got so afraid. its like any new idea or suggestion is shot down with claims that most times are not accurately based. My experience is with end of life care. EOL care is usually the most expensive and a lot of times it does not prolong life quality wise or quantity wise and yet many doctors cannot even discuss alternatives with their patients simply because a small group starting yelling "pulling the plug on grandma". So now you can't even breathe the word.

 

[CdnCarrie]

What does skew the statistics are that some Canadians are treated in the U.S. healthcare system - people on vacation or business and snowbirds. Canadians do travel to the U.S. a lot for many reasons.

 

[CdnCarrie]

Here's a 2009 article from a medical journal saying the low income Americans wait longer for breast cancer treatment than Canadians. It's just the citation and abstract from Pubmed.


Clin Invest Med. 2009 Jun 1;32(3):E239-49.
Wait times for surgical and adjuvant radiation treatment of breast cancer in Canada and the United States: greater socioeconomic inequity in America.
Gorey KM, Luginaah IN, Holowaty EJ, Fung KY, Hamm C.

Abstract
PURPOSE:

The demand for cancer care has increased among aging North American populations as cancer treatment innovations have proliferated. Gaps between supply and demand may be growing. This study examined whether socioeconomic status has a differential effect on waits for surgical and adjuvant radiation treatment (RT) of breast cancer in Canada and the US.
METHODS:

Ontario and California cancer registries provided 929 and 984 breast cancer cases diagnosed between 1998 and 2000 in diverse urban and rural places. Residence-based socioeconomic data were taken from censuses. Cancer care variables were reliably abstracted from health records: stage, receipt of surgery and RT, and waits from diagnosis to initial and initial to adjuvant treatment. Median waits were compared within- and between-country with the non-parametric Mann-Whitney U-test. Categorically long, age-adjusted wait comparisons used the Mantel-Haenszel chi-square test.
RESULTS:

There were significant associations between lower socioeconomic status and longer surgical waits, lower access to adjuvant RT and to longer RT waits across diverse places in California. None were observed in Ontario. The two cohorts did not practically differ on access to surgery or on surgical waits. Compared with their counterparts in California, low-income Ontarians, particularly those in small urban places, gained greater access to RT, while high-income Americans had shorter waits for RT.
CONCLUSIONS:

This historical study contextualized Canada's "waiting-list problems" with evidence on breast cancer care, where lower income Americans seemed to have waited as long as similar Canadians. Many more low-income Americans seemed to experience the longest wait of all for adjuvant care. They simply did not receive it. In contrast to stark American socioeconomic inequity, this study evidenced remarkable equity in Canadian breast cancer care.

 

[justbishop]

Perhaps you should spend the time and read what I said closer. I said the profits used to fund the research are made in the US.

My bad, I misunderstood your wording. I have no factual knowledge on this, so i'm not going to argue the point with you. For all I know, you're correct

Didn't work so well in Massachusetts! The cost of Massachusetts' plan has increased by a staggering 42% since 2006. In order to control costs, the current governor is considering price controls, limits coverage, more exclusions, and an overall spending cap.
Some countries in Europe may go a step further by limiting the treatment available for the elderly, terminally ill, and infants. According to USA Today Cost-cutting has also hit Switzerland. The numbers of beds have dropped, hospitals have merged, and specialist care has become harder to find. A 2007 survey found that in some hospitals in Geneva and Lausanne, the rates of medical mistakes had jumped by up to 40%. Long ranked as having one of the world's top four health systems, Switzerland dropped to 8th place in a Europe-wide survey last year.

Isn't that ranking still better than the US, though? (Serious question)

LOL. Overwhelmingly good things to say about having to wait 6 months or so to have a hip replacement operation? Socialist medicine sucks and the last thing I want to do is to short-change my doctor. Don't you see what is happening to Europe and the nanny state agenda that they have embraced? It doesn't work.

Waiting 6 months for a hip replacement > Not getting the hip replacement at all because you can't find the cash to pay for it (or the deductible, if you have insurance that covers part of it) in your budget.

My mother lived and worked in that system.

She is now 100% disabled due to the incompetence of such system that misdiagnosed her issue for 5 years before finally agreeing to do an MRI and confirming that she had suffered fracture in her spine that healed wrong. (Clarification: It took them 5 years to find that there had been a fracture.)

Oh--then there was the denial of services when she presented with 3rd degree burns on her leg, but out of uniform. She went to a civilian doctor and got excellent care and had to fight her way to get the military to pay her bill.

Then I have my friend currently in the military with an ongoing issue. She cannot find any relief with the issue--and the doctors are just taking their sweet time in it. She has gotten the assistance of a relative physician to know exactly what to ask for--but no luck.

Free healthcare is handy--but to assume that it isn't without very serious issues is naive.

Don't get me started on the charities that help our wounded soldiers because the services aren't sufficient enough to take care of them all in the existing system. The service men and women don't pay--but it required privately raised funds to help them.

Tried to just read the thread--but thought I would pop in with my friends/family experiences.

No one is saying that universal healthcare systems are free...or perfect. For most people in the US that either can't afford insurance at a ll, or go broke trying to pay their insurance deductibles when something does happen, universal care is looking a lot better than nothing.

I have worked in health care in both Canada and the US. Just last year, my Canadian friend found a breast lump. My friend was going to have to wait six to eight months for a mammogram just to diagnose the lump, whereas I could make a call in the US and get a mammogram the next day. Obviously, I don't have to tell you that that much time could make a significant difference in treatment if the lump turned out to be cancer.

I was making plans to bring my friend here and we'd pay out of pocket for the test, but luckily, my friend is in the military and pulled some strings very hard to get a mammogram faster and the lump was benign. But what would the average person do?

In my experience, socialized medicine gives everyone equal access to the same crappy system.

Again, waiting 6 months for a mammogram > Not getting the mammogram at all because you can't find the cash in your budget to pay for it.

 

[Chris the CPA]

Really, do you know of an implanted insulin pump available here in the US like it is in Germany?

Just because you feel something is so and I quote from your above post "Canada, UK, and France have no where the near the population of the US. We have more people who do not pay taxes than the total population of each of these countries. The innovations in medicine are paid for by the profit made in the US. The yearly R&D budgets of Merck or Roche are almost as much as some small country's GDP." doesn't make it so either. We choose to believe what we know and what we choose to believe.

It appears that the first implanted insulin pump was developed in Minnesota. I do believe that is in the US but please don't quote me do the research yourself.

http://theiipump.com/documents/the_developmental_history_of_the_implantable_insulin_pump.pdf

 

[Chris the CPA]

Well it is great to hear that it has finally been made available in the US. When my niece got hers she was a child in Germany and it was a first and unheard of here in the US.

Besides this was actually for Chris the CPA who seems to be trolling and doubted what I originally wrote.

Sorry, I wasn't around but I have already refuted your assertion in another posts but thanks for playing. Since it was invented in the US I would find it hard to believe it was unheard of.

 

[Chris the CPA]

Sort of. He also is contracted to work for the military for a certain number of years, so they trade. They pay for the school, he works for them for a very long time. Dh joined the military in 1996 and cannot leave until 2022. He cannot leave before then, under any circumstances. He is completely at the Navy's mercy, so if they decide to deploy him, or send him overseas unaccompanied, or even tell him that he can't be a doctor anymore, or what type of doctor he will be, then they have the right to do that. For instance, he is a pediatrician, but they sent him to Afghanistan for 15 months doing adult trauma. He'd never taken care of adults, and not too many kids step on IED's or get shot. But that's what they expected him to do. And I should say he did it very well, and was written up in the international news for some of the things he did and received a very high medal, as well, so no matter what he is good at what he does.

So,it is not like you are implying, that the taxpayers are giving him a free education - he is working for that education.

First let me express my deep appreciation for him serving his country.

By no means was I implying that he is not earning his training. I deeply appreciate the fact that he is serving his country and doing the best he can. Some of the best trauma innovations have come from war. I was saying that all the drugs, tests, supplies etc. are not free and that the military (us taxpayers) do indeed have to pay for those.

 

[PatsMom]

One interesting thing I have noticed reading the posts on the Canadian system is that it appears to me to be largely run on a provincial level, not a national level. On a psychological level, I could probably deal a lot more with the "little" state government running my health care than the federal government doing it. States mess up but they are easier to change than federal law. And it would allow each state to provide the level of benefit that the voters feel is appropriate. Of course, then you would have issues with those in wealthier states having better benefits. I don't know if that is the case in Canada or not - I am not an expert on their system and don't pretend to be!

 

[eliza61]

One interesting thing I have noticed reading the posts on the Canadian system is that it appears to me to be largely run on a provincial level, not a national level. On a psychological level, I could probably deal a lot more with the "little" state government running my health care than the federal government doing it. States mess up but they are easier to change than federal law. And it would allow each state to provide the level of benefit that the voters feel is appropriate. Of course, then you would have issues with those in wealthier states having better benefits. I don't know if that is the case in Canada or not - I am not an expert on their system and don't pretend to be!

One thing that is pretty ironic though Pat is that this year health insurance rose 9% thats 3x's the rate of inflation. inflation was at 3% and its also almost 4x's the rate of peoples salary's. that is not a sustainable cost for the average american family.

So it's going to be a moot point because as less and less people can afford medical insurance, more and more people are going to be on a public health system anyway. Medicare.
More and more seniors can no longer afford private health insurance so more and more seniors end up on a public health system anyway. Medicaid.
Remember seniors are also one of the growing parts of our population.

So by refusing to fix this problem, we end up with the very thing every one is afraid of, a public health system run by the feds because whether or not we want to believe it, these people are not going away and when it comes to the choice between feeding your kids and paying an outrageous health insurance premium most folks worry about the most pressing need and that's food or rent.

I find that highly ironic.

 

[Bonnie151]

It appears that the first implanted insulin pump was developed in Minnesota. I do believe that is in the US but please don't quote me do the research yourself.

http://theiipump.com/documents/the_developmental_history_of_the_implantable_insulin_pump.pdf

I think the point was the assertion that implantable insulin pumps are available in Europe but not readily available in the US. As far as I am aware (and I am open to correction), implantable insulin pumps are used more for research purposes in the US. A different source for you (bolding mine):

"An implantable pump was created in the 1980′s but there were difficulties. The implantable pump was placed just under the skin and it was clearly visible. There was a projection from the surgery site much like having a hockey puck placed under the skin. The pump could be implanted in the abdomen or on the chest of the pump user. This pump was refilled with a large-gauge needle and the user carried a programming unit and held the unit over the pump to deliver instructions for refilling the pump. Patients could self-administer a bolus dose with a remote-control device. These pumps are still used on an experimental basis in the United States but are available overseas."


http://www.diabetes-support.org.uk/info/?p=287