Read about a test that would cost $86,000 in the USA and cost NOTHING in Canada!

[1776Forever]

Please pass this around!

One of my sons almost lost his life because he had no health insurance. I am FOR a public option that would be run like Medicare. If someone you know thinks that the private health insurance companies aren't feeding them bull crap and that the Canadian Health Insurance public option isn't a good service then please let them read this. AND remember the private HMO's aren't spending BILLIONS to defeat this for nothing!!!

This is a true story about the mother of Daniel Negreanu (the Poker Star) who had a stroke while living in Las Vegas, Nevada. She and her son are native Canadians and when she was taken to a hospital in Las Vegas they wanted to do a test that would have cost her $86,000 in the USA and cost her NOTHING in Canada!

………………………
http://www.pokerroad.com/blog/daniel-negreanu/posts/my-mother-is-very-sick

After she was taken to the hospital.......The next day my brother arrived and she seemed to be getting even better by then and we looked forward to her release the next morning. When we got to the hospital, her bed was gone. They moved her to ICU (Intensive Care Unit). They explained that her oxygen levels had dropped dramatically. Not seemingly related to the stroke, but a problem she's had before. They worried it was either a clot in her lungs or possibly heart failure. They later ruled that she also had a heart attack.

The plan was for her to have an angiogram test done on Monday. Her travel insurance wouldn't cover it, though, and when she got wind of how much it would cost she refused to agree to it. She is old school, and no matter what, there is just no way she'd let me pay for it. The price, when I heard it, seemed completely absurd for a test and I didn't believe it until I went online to confirm. I saw the price of the test figured at $86,000. That same test in India would cost $1400, but we aren't in India.

I've done dumber things with that kind of money before. If the test has to be done I'd pay for it in a heartbeat. Problem is, I know my mother. I love her to death, but she wouldn't let me pay $8000 for the test let alone $80,000. That's just the way she is and she is not going to change her ways at the age of 69.

So the plan has changed. Tomorrow it looks like they are planning to put her on an air ambulance with two nurses and fly her back to Toronto where she can be cared for. They can do the test there, all covered by OHIP. She feels much safer being in Canada and I know she trusts the doctors there which is good for her spirits, which I must say, are pretty good considering.

She looked great today. She won't eat the food, though, all she really eats are bananas and skim milk. My mom is a great cook and is sometimes hard to please! Hospital food just isn't going to cut it for her.

She hasn't been allowed to walk at all for several days and she is still on oxygen but even her oxygen levels are improving. If we don't send her to Toronto, and instead agree to the Angiogram, nurses explained that the costs of her stay will likely exceed $200,000. If I paid them that money, I can promise you, that would only induce another heart attack for my mother.

..........

Thanks to Daniel for posting this on his blog and prayers for his Mother for a speedy recovery!

:grouphug:

[TexasObserver]

1. Recommend

[ejpoeta]

2. but everyone wants to have OUR system. yeah, we are the lucky ones

and everyone else envies us. why do people buy that crap!! i mean, come on!! how many canadians go into bankruptcy over an illness? how many in england and france??!! how many americans. but we are the best and everyone wants to be like us. uggh.

[SammyWinstonJack]

7. Brain dead morans! All of them. They'll believe anything they NEED to believe.

why do people buy that crap!!


Oh and those people are selfish/self-serving a$$hole$, too!

[ejpoeta]

8. i totally agree.

[gopiscrap]

3. I had cancer in 1987

and was able to skate through that with relatively few financial bruises...I had cancer a second time 1992 this time uninsured and it wound up being 186,000K 1993-1994 dollars. I didn't have that kind of money and since I had been working to that time didn't qualify for help. What I did was file for US Bankruptcy protection. Each time I did it, it stopped the collections clock and also forced them to continue treating me. What I didn't do was go through with all the bankruptcies because I knew I would just keep accumalating bills and would eventually be denied treatment. Becaue I beat the medical creditors at their own game, I was charged with abuse of the US Bankrutcy Court and spent 11 months in a Federal Prison. Would I do it again...in a fucking heartbeat!!!!..it saved my life! Sad that our country has to have these kinds of stories...on the flip side, I was born in Germany (Made my US citizenship in 1972) and had encephalitis as a baby (1959) . I spent 6 months in the hospital, part of it in intensive care...the bill? $11.87 which would be about $300.00 in today's money ...buts that universal health care!!!

[1776Forever]

4. Thank you for sharing your story. It is such a tragedy. We lost our home too.

My son wasn't married when he developed Progressive MS. He had no minor children either so we became his sole source of income. For 2 years we fought for him to get SSI and finally he got it but it was still a struggle to get quality care for him through his HMO in Florida. SSI is run with HMO's there which is something I didn't know until he received Medicaid through the SSI program.

These HMO's pay slowly and most Specialist, like those that specialize in MS and other "orphan" diseases, won't even take it. We finally got the medications he needed from one of the State run Universities. He hasn't had a hospital stay now for over a week in 4 years! Before he was on the meds he was in and out of the hospital over a dozen times a year and also had a couple of stays in Nursing Homes. God only knows I wish this on no one as the pain that the loved one goes through is felt deeply by those that care for them also.

Blessings!

:hug:

[Stephanie]

5. Welcome to DU!

And I like your user name. -S

[gopiscrap]

6. Thanks Stephanie

I got a new computer...my post count is acutally 1800 something I am norepubsin08 but I forgot my password and so I had to get a new account..I'm a donor and everything-Peace-Mike C

[JBoy]

9. And this is after she did all the "right" things before travelling to the US

Any smart Canadian knows to take out supplemental insurance if you travel to the US, but all that buys you is a general admission ticket to US-style healthcare. There are obvious limits, such as what she encountered, driven by the profit motive. Someone getting between the patient and their doctor.

Very often older Canadians can't afford to travel to the US, because of the out-of-pocket health insurance costs.

[wolfgangmo]

10. Anyone in the tourism industry listening?

"Very often older Canadians can't afford to travel to the US, because of the out-of-pocket health insurance costs."

How many billions are we losing because of that?

[1776Forever]

11. Excellent observation! This issue is so much bigger then it looks at first!

:fistbump:

[Greyskye]

12. Wow, had no clue this would be about someone I 'know'

Good luck to Daniel's mom.

K&R

[Posteritatis]

13. $86K for a *test*?

Aren't there transplants that cost less?

[kirby]

14. Headline is misleading...

That price is probably the cost of the Intensive Care Unit, etc.

I have had that 'test' and it does not cost that much.

[1776Forever]

17. This is what was posted and you should be aware all States & hospitals can charge what they wish to!

That is one of the big problems with our current health care system!

[kirby]

18. I didnt say it was not a problem, just that the headline is inaccurate...

There is no way that particular test cost that much. And I know because I have had the procedure. My entire billed cost was $12,000, but the insurance covered about $8,000 (that included hospital and ambulance). And I live in an expensive state.

As far as to messed up the system is, it is next to impossible to figure out my bills to accurately pinpoint the cost of the test. The insurance company denied everything initially and it took a battle to get them to pay.

My point is that it does not help the cause when facts are misleading because people who have experience with something will know it is not accurate.

[DollyM]

28. our dead son's bill . . .

Our 19 year old son was killed in a car wreck on May 30th. Killed on impact I might add. He was taken by ambulance to the hospital, laid on a table and pronounced dead. The hospital bill was $2200.00 and within a week of ours son's death they were calling and wanting payment because he did not have health insurance. The only procedure done at the hospital that I can tell was the x rays the coroner took which were a couple of hundred dollars, we received a separate bill for that so I know that wasn't it. How can a hosptial charge 2200.00 for "medical care" when none was given? He was dead on arrival. Maybe pulling out the tube that the ambulance crew put in (ambulance is also a separate bill)was worth $2200.00? I don't know and still haven't figured this out but this is downright ridiculous. I would have have sold a kidney to have paid for medical care to have saved my son's life but to charge that much to pronounce someone dead, is absurd.

[SidDithers]

15. One minor quibble...

there is no "Canadian Health Insurance public option". That description implies that we have a choice between a public or private insurance program to cover our health care costs.

What we have is single payer, publicly financed health care. There's no "option" involved. We get treatment for our ills, and our government pays for it. Some Canadians have extended health insurance, which pays for treatments not covered by our government, such as physical therapy, or massage, dental and perscription meds.

Thanks for posting :)

Sid

[1776Forever]

16. Thanks for posting - I was referring to our US chance of having this type of health care "option".

You made it clearer.

Thanks for your input!

:fistbump:

[Autonomy]

19. Wow, I always liked him

on the poker shows, but I never knew he was such a really cool guy.

[1776Forever]

22. Yes - He is a really cool guy! He is devoted to his wonderful Mom too.

Thanks for the post.

:fistbump:

[mopinko]

20. please. canadian healthcare is not free. people pay taxes for it.

i understand how it works, but still think that it is disingenuous to describe things that cost everyone money as free. i don't think of the fire department or the cops as free. i think of them as things we all pay for.

[1776Forever]

21. OK - But it still didn't cost her to have the test in Canada over the cost of her taxes.

No way would it have come even CLOSE to the cost of her health care! I think most of the US Citizens would be glad to pay a few more dollars to have this kind of care and not have to worry about bankruptcy! I personally am covered under TriCare the VA Insurance for Military Families and I could not be more happy with it. If we can do this for the Military we can do it for all our citizens!

[mopinko]

23. well the polls say otherwise, and

i don't think we are talking about a few dollars, either. we can do it for all our citizens, but it is going to cost real money. you are doing nothing here but sabotaging the debate with this dewy eyed drivel.

[1776Forever]

25. You may have your opinion but I am NOT sabotaging anything! I am stating facts!

Have you had a loved one without insurance almost loose their lives? I hope to GOD you don't have to go through that pain and misery or your loved ones don't either! Facts are facts!

[DFW]

24. I had a situation that was in the same vein

I had an emergency stent implant in Germany. I had to pay the bill in Germany and submit it to my (at the time) United Health Care for reimbursement. They gave me hell because the clinic in Germany wasn't approved by them in advance. The procedure cost less than a third of what the same procedure would have cost in the USA, AND THEY READILY ADMITTED IT. And STILL they refused to reimburse me for about nine months until we threatened to change insurance carriers (we did about a year later anyway).

When my wife got cancer eight years ago, she had two operations, and after the second one they kept her in the hospital for about three weeks. She then had chemotherapy over the course of three months and then five or six weeks of radiation. After that, she was sent to a rehab spa in the Black Forest for a month, where she had physical therapy, aquatic therapy, massage therapy, and counseling. Her insurance covered everything, up to and including the train ride from Düsseldorf down to Offenburg and back, and a clinic bus picked her up from Offenburg, and took her back there when her month was up. I hate to think what her treatment would have been under some typical American insurance plan, or how it would have bankrupted us had she had no insurance at all. She is a German citizen, living in Germany, and so had no such worries (like she didn't have enough worries getting cancer). It makes me seethe with frustration to think that my own country has stories of health care horrors that I wouldn't suspect of happening in Albania.

[1776Forever]

26. Thank you from the bottom of my heart for stating your situation! It is time to stand on the facts!

We need Health Care Reform NOW!

Blessings!

[McCamy Taylor]

27. My sympathies

:hug:

[demigoddess]

29. no wonder our rate for heart disease deaths is up. nobody can afford that test

and I bet a bunch of insurance companies wouldn't either.