On Wed, 2 Apr 2008 17:47:22 -0700, "Billzz"
<billzzstring@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
>"Nomen Nescio" <nobody@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote in message
>news:cee0309c375c6e3a3f41b02584675644@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>> Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's administration has moved to ban
>> physicians and hospitals from billing patients for the cost of services
>> above what their HMOs are willing to pay.
>>
>> Such bills, which patient advocates call a consumer abuse, are the
>> product of a protracted feud between insurers and healthcare providers,
>> principally emergency room doctors, radiologists and anesthesiologists.
>>
>> ==
>>
>> Do you want to go to an emergency room where the doctors
>> are forced to work on you without pay?
>>
>> I don't think so.
>
>There are a number of emergency rooms where the doctors work on illegal
>aliens and uninsured patients without pay. Without pay for them. But the
>doctors get paid. We pay for both us and the poor. Particularly the
trauma
>centers. I could go into detail about the Baltimore Shock Trauma unit,
but
>why bother. Reasonable people know about the situation. We are all
paying
>a surcharge for the indigent.
>
>The bottom line is that people who pay, pay for those who do not pay.
And
>if you pay cash, then you pay much more than what an HMO can negotiate.
>You'll pay ten dollars for a box of Kleenex.
>
>My sixteen-year old son was directed by a so-called friend to drive his
>stock car off the trailer, into the garage. The so-called friend did not
>tell my son that the dirt track race car, never driven by my son, had
>limited brakes. Also the so-called amigo (hereinafter called the idiot)
>placed himself in front of the car while directing it, so it crashed into
>him, pinning him against a freezer, breaking both legs. He was
ambulanced
>to Parkland Hospital, in Dallas, Texas, the one trauma center that takes
>uninsured, because, of course, the idiot had no medical. Subsequently he
>sued ME. My insurance company said that he had more than 50%
>responsibility, but that they would, like they always did, settle outside
of
>court, giving his extortionist lawyer his fee, while the idiot got a
>pittance. In my next Dallas County property tax bill they stated the
amount
>that was set aside for indigent care at Parkland Hospital, which I was to
>pay. So I pay for insurance, I pay property taxes, and the indigent pay
>nothing. I paid. Since I was retired I even bought the idiot his lunch
>every day. I moved from Texas but it does not make any difference. We
are
>all paying for the poor. One way or the other, we are all paying the
bills.
>Even my church sends money to the poor. Even to foreign countries that
are
>sending us their poor. No one asks me. I'm just expected to pay. So
are
>you.
>
Most of us docs do not mind performing services at reduced or gratis
rates to help patients, whether or not they are "legal" or "illegal"
(illegals get sick, too). But when we are bound to accept what the
HMOs say are "reasonable" rates, we are giving "charity" to the big
insurance companies, and most of us reject that.
I have stopped signing contracts with HMOs that pay below reasonable
rates, and in those where I am already contracted, I am refusing to
renew those contracts when they come up for renewal unless the
insurance companies will pay a better rate.
Best,
Bob
Robert A. Fink, M. D., FACS, P. C.
Neurological Surgery
2500 Milvia Street Suite 222
Berkeley, CA 94704-2636 USA
510-849-2555
"Ex Tristitia Virtus"
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