Bad car accident

[The Straight Story]

(In Honor of my best friend Scott who died in a car accident)

John was in a bad accident. Car was on fire, he was bleeding bad.

A bunch of socialist firefighters showed up and pulled him from the wreckage (his spouse never did get a bill for that, and the firefighters never did check his insurance card).

Plopped there onto the side of the road. But wait! He was taken to the hospital, who could not deny him care in an emergency.

Patched up quickly by our fine doctors/nurses/technicians.

"Well, all we need to do is operate and fix your liver, which was damaged in the accident, and you will be good to go."

Insurance company denies the operation, he used to drink some so they see it as a pre-existing condition (even though all previous tests showed his liver as ok).

He dies.

What is wrong with this picture?

[jtrockville]

1. In a nutshell: a for-profit corporation got between John and his Doctor.

I'd like to know why the medical community hasn't risen up agaist this sooner.

Edited to add: I'm so sorry for your loss.

[liberalhistorian]

18. Becaue they're too busy demanding protection

from accountability from the results of their negligence, as well as protecting their precious profits.

[AnneD]

21. FYI...

Many Nurses have been fighting for this for a long time. The for profit business model just doesn't work. We figured that out one the bean counter increased the Nurse patient ratio to unsafe levels and they tried to cross train the house keeping staff to perform cathaterizations. I swear to God that one is true! Nurses couldn't shoot THAT trial balloon down fast enough.

[jtrockville]

22. Yes, the nurses organizations have been very outspoken.

Thanks for all the hard work from these folks!

[MNDemNY]

2. Nothing. It points out the fact that we have the BEST HEALTH CARE SYSTEM ON EARTH.

If you do not agree, you must be a commie-nazi-pinko-fag.

[closeupready]

5. This.

:sarcasm:

[BumRushDaShow]

3. The corporate death panel made their decision. n/t

[grantcart]

7. yep

[Junkdrawer]

4. True story?

:shrug:

[The Straight Story]

9. See here:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=6512271&mesg_id=6512271

[The Straight Story]

10. And about my friend scott

He lost a lot of blood and was rushed to hospital, and died that night.

He was not denied health care, but the link I posted above shows some are denied life saving care.

[deaniac21]

6. How would they know about drinking?

[The Straight Story]

11. You think an insurance company does not know :)

Doctors asked these kind of questions all the time, and they keep medical histories.

See my link above for more info.

[lunatica]

15. I just had cataract surgery and part of the pre-surgery

workup and paperwork was to answer questions like about whether you drink or smoke and how much. It's standard in any paperwork because that's how the insurance companies get their info. You can't get your surgery without answering those questions.

[deaniac21]

16. Who would answer that they drank enough to get liver damage?

[jtrockville]

23. I guess we have to choose between being honest

with our personal habits so our doctor isn't in-the-dark, vs risking losing reimbursement for our medical bills.

[G_j]

8. it proves there are "death panels" nt

[rrneck]

12. About half of our

entire economy is devoted to profit from human misery.

[TxRider]

13. The problem with that kind of sideways argument...

Is that the other side can just as easily point to a directly conflicting case that shows the opposite.

One thing I have learned in life is that it's always best to distill the argument to simplest point.

Is health care a right? Should it be?

If not is it not a moral imperative for the wealthiest nation on earth to ensure health care for all?

If you can't win a person over on those simple terms, your wasting your time.

[The Straight Story]

14. I will distill it down even further

We spend a ton on defense to save lives - pool our money for that.

And yet more die from lack of proper care than from Osama/etc.

Simply by proxy we should be paying for health care for all of us, and yet folks are not interested in saving lives when there are not cool weapons involved and death of enemies.

[shireen]

17. sickening!

they denied coverage because he used to drink?! I hope his wife sued the bastards!!!

I'm sorry to hear about your friend .... :hug:

[The Straight Story]

19. For clarification please - they did not deny my friend care

My friend got care, but still died. Based on my research (see other threads I have posted on it all) some folks have been denied care for various other things (to save companies money).

It was a mix of something that occurred in real life (my friend was helped by fire dept, did get to hospital, later died) and what we see happening daily with people be denying cared based on money (like Andy was).

Sorry for the confusion. I should have been more clear in my OP.

[spanone]

20. insurance company = death panel

[Fla Dem]

24. OK Here's where I have a serious problems with all of this........

1st, that an insurance company denied coverage for a life saving procedure. Despicable isn't too strong a word for their actions.

But secondly, this isn't the first time I have read an account where a person who was already in a hospital, under a doctor's care needed life saving treatment and was denied resulting in that person's death. What boggles my mind is the medical personnel NOT SAVING THE PERSON'S LIFE ANYWAY. I realize someone has to pay for their services, but my God how do you walk away from a dying person when you know you can save them. Do you just say to them, sorry Joe no tickie, no shirtie? DO you pack up their pajamas for them and say go home and die? Or do you just leave them there to die a slow painful death? When does the "no one is denied health care" kick in?

The examples the President gave in his speech.....a man halfway through chemo...denied further treatment....dies. A woman needing a double mastecomy....denied.....dies. When does the medical profession step up and say I don't care if you have insurance or not. I am a doctor, and if I can save your life I will.

[lunatica]

25. They would get fired instantly before they even saw the patient again

And no hospital would be allowed to hire them.