We'e getting screwed! What health care costs in civilized countries.

[eridani]

[bhikkhu]

1. Absolutely - a big part of what the ACA is supposed to begin fixing

...for whatever reason, we have ended up with a healthcare industry that does for $2.3 trillion annually what other healthcare systems do for $1 trillion annually!

If you want to start looking at structural problems in our spending that, one way or another, lead to debt, that's the one on the list that sticks out about as far as military spending. Both are going in the right direction now, with the last war ending (202 Afghanistan bases closed recently and a 2014 exit date) and the ACA fully implemented in 2013.

[tclambert]

2. Socialism! Wait, nobody told me socialism is cheaper.

I might like to buy me some of that. Save some money. (See, that right there is how a competitive marketplace (as opposed to a "free" market) is supposed to work.)

[reformist2]

3. Price controls are a good thing in markets where people feel pressure to buy at any cost.

The academic "free market" concept of a consumer going to Acme Superstore and buying a widget doesn't really apply when it comes to buying life-saving drugs or medical procedures.

[DFW]

4. I had the dubious honor of a direct comparison last year

In 2011, I had two hospitalizations with major surgery. One was in Düsseldorf, one was in Dallas. The care was comparable, and the surgery in Germany took longer, and needed a specialist. The surgery in Dallas was a routine angioplasty after a very mild heart attack.

The bill for the German care was 9000 euros, about $11,000. The bill in Dallas was $35,000, "discounted" to $26,500 for the insurance company (I still don't get that one).

This is one thing I did get the chance to point out in person to President Obama last month. If he hadn't gotten any first hand comparisons up to then, he has one now, and one of his top strategists emailed me afterward to remind me that what I said had not gone unnoticed. I don't know what they think they can do about it, but I'd say that someone in the White House thinks it's worth finding out.

[Quantess]

17. You pointed that out to Obama in person?

I'm Jealous!

[DFW]

19. I most definitely did!

http://www.democraticunderground.com/125170848

[SmileyRose]

5. I'm skeptical on the prices quoted elsewhere.

I can believe out of pocket cost for an angiogram (cardiac cath) or even what the Canadian health system will pay the facility is $35 but there's no way the full cost of that procedure is $35 in Canada. I would think the threshold to safely provide the service would be at least $200.

[csziggy]

11. Perhaps other countries' health care system does not include PROFIT

I know locally that radiographs are expensive because the medical group that specializes in X-rays and mammograms expects a hefty profit for the use of their machines, the time of their technicians, and the services of the radiologists that read the results.

For years that single group had a monopoly on providing those services in town. Their prices were outrageously high and they would not even apply for insurance - patients had to pay them then apply to their insurance companies for reimbursement.

Now many doctors' groups have their own machines and their own technicians, but the radiologists groups still has a lock on their professional services. The cost of a mammogram has been cut in half (from 1989 until now) but the cost of the radiologist is still extremely high - high enough that most insurance companies will not cover the full cost and the patient has to pay the difference out of pocket.

The doctors' group still expect a profit on the use of their machines so radiographs are still high compared to other countries. The only difference is that the doctors' groups don't expect as high a profit as the radiology group does.

Health care should not require providing a massive profit for every aspect of the service. I don't expect doctors to work for a pittance but when they collect over $100 for a 10 minute consultation, why should they also make hundreds of dollars for the use of the equipment they prescribe you to use?

[davidpdx]

6. I don't how much a gold crown costs in the US but

but in South Korea I paid about $350 for one this month. I bet it's at least twice that.

[eridani]

12. My husband got an emergency root canal in the Netherlands fo $25 American

That was in 1996. In 1998 I paid $800 for equivalent treatment.

[davidpdx]

14. Your dental work was done in the US?

Then it would be more than that now. At least twice.

[eridani]

15. I was just talking the first part, not the crown

Haven't needed one since 1998, she sez, crossing fingers.

[rudy1129]

20. crown in South Korea

Hi David. Do you mind sharing your dentists name? I too, am in South Korea and need a dental crown. Thank you. Cheers!

[Godot51]

7. Japan

I've lived in Japan since '79 and have been paying into the National Health care system here ever since, my current rate comes to about $3000 per year and that includes my wife, my 30 year old daughter and myself (my son is a public school teacher and pays his own way).
In general I find American health costs (across a wide range of services) are 10X and often more.
At my age (61) I pay 30% of the bill while the National Health pays the other 70%.
A few examples that I have experience personally: a root canal, about 10,000 yen ($120). I paid 3000 yen.
A total knee replacement, about $7000 of which I paid only 10% because my injury was caused by an accident (fell off a ladder 8 years ago, had my bones set but arthritis set in bad 2 years ago).
This included hospitalization, the operation, all care and rehabilitation. I later got a few hundred dollars back since my rehab didn't take as long as the average and so I'd been overcharged. Also I left the hospital early due to a quick recovery.
A private room costs about $40 a day (meals included) but a ward is free (meals extra but very cheap, a few dollars a day) if you can handle 4 or 5 roommates.
The nurses found me a semi-private room with no roommate for most of my 10 day stay.
Another cost example: my wife' medication for hypertension (including a monthly checkup) costs her about $40 a month.
The National Health does a good (but not great) job of keeping the costs of medicines, care and treatments and so on down. And every doctor or dentist I know is well off, not a millionaire but much better off than "average".
Now, before you all decide to move to Japan, there are quite a few problems, the biggest being a financial shortage for the care of the elderly, of whom there are too many due to excellent health care (Catch 22 anyone?).
There are also the "baby boomers" who are no longer blooming. (And I among them.)
These are both temporary (everybody dies sooner or later) and are fixable.
Mainly what's needed is a slight raise in the payment percentage of those who can afford it and a general raising of the whole population's payments into the system. Nothing drastic. Government are not businesses; they're not supposed to make a profit.
Of course, the do nothing, prime minister per year government is in a panic mode over how to fix this; they're proposing to raise the national sales tax from the current 5% to (eventually) 10%. I do believe they've been inspired by the Republicans willingness to push more taxes on the poor than on the rich.
Oh well, what the hell...

[secondwind]

8. We were touring in Nova Scotia in 2009, when I found myself with severe pain in the left

shoulder. We were at our next destination, Annapolis Royal, early in the afternoon, on a Sunday. We drove up to our host's home and I complained about my shoulder. He picked up the phone and called the local hospital, and turned to me and said "they are waiting for you".

My husband and I drove to the local hospital, it was clean, and not full at all.. My waiting time was less than 15 minutes. I was tended to by a doctor from Brunswick, who x-rayed my shoulder in various positions (three x-rays). He then spent almost 40 minutes with me, he told me I had a slight tear on my rotator cuff, and showed me some exercises I could do to alleviate the pain. He said he didn't think I needed surgery. I felt so much better when I walked out of his examination room!

When I went to pay for the services, I was shocked. Three x-rays cost 110 Canadian. And my doctor's fee was 55 Canadian.

And he was right. I never did need surgery.

[secondwind]

9. I forgot. Had another episode of "socialized medicine" in France when I got the flu in a

small town and went to the local doctor. He examined me, gave me the required medicines and that was that. No fee, and he was as nice as could be. No charge for medicine, no charge for the physician.

[area51]

10. What we need to fix this

is single-payer health care, not the GingrichCare that we got from congress.

Keeping for-profit, serial-killer health care agencies in the mix, standing in the way of the doctor-patient relationship, will not fix this.

"We will never have real reform until people's health stops being treated as a financial opportunity for corporations."

"Employer-based health insurance has always been a bad idea. Your life should not depend on who you work for." -- T. McKeon

[font face="times"]"Any proposal that sticks with our current dependence on for-profit private insurers ... will not be sustainable. And the new law will not get us to universal coverage ...." -- T.R. Reid, The Healing of America[/font]

"Despite the present hyperbole by its supporters, this latest effort will end up as just another failed reform effort littering the landscape of the last century." --John Geyman, M.D., Hijacked! The Road to Single Payer in the Aftermath of Stolen Health Care Reform

[Rex]

13. That is because politicians care more about material wealth

then they do about living beings. We live in the age of Materialism and America leads the way.

[moondust]

16. One of the advantages

of NOT being the BIG BAD SUPERPOWER with lots of big corporations demanding record profits and calling the shots is probably that your government *can* remain responsive to THE PEOPLE and together you can make good things happen for everybody.

[spin]

18. Sad but true. (n/t)