Quote:
Originally Posted by Cowperson
A Canadian doctor diagnoses USA healthcare today in the LA Times.
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/...0,538126.story
Truthfully, both sides could learn something from the other. The doctor talks about the split 50 years ago . . . . . but it's that ideological divide, now entrenched, that prevents improvements in both arenas.
Cowperson |
It is a good article. My own perception from living in both countries is that Canada's system is vastly more efficient. I got some insight into it when I first moved to the US, and had to get an emergency appendectomy. I had taken out the AMA insurance to subsidize my Canadian health care for the first year I was here. That alone made things interesting. The second thing is they kind of botched the surgery a bit, so I had to stay about twice as long as normal for that type of procedure.
There were no less than 7 different entities sending bills!! Anesthesiologist, ER dr, Operating room doctor, CT scan company, xray company, hospital, hospital pharmacy. All 7 send very high bills, that the insurance company then has to negotiate lower (to usually about half, pretty ironic that insurance companies pay about half the price for the same service compared to an individual billed directly). Then the insurance company pushed back, since it was the dr that botched it, why should they pay for keeping me there for 4 extra days! This went on and on for about a year. Took up at least 40 hours of my time, I assume at least 200 hours of lawyers, actuaries, administrators time, and so on. I had marks put on my credit at one point I had to get removed, it was a complete nightmare! Couldn't help but think that cost at least 10,000 more in admin costs than it would have in Canada.
Now that I am on a big company health plan, everything is fairly smooth. We've had a couple child births, and a few medical conditions and er visits, and I'd say that for someone like us the quality of care is better than my (and families experiences in Canada) for similar things. But I'd still have a slight preference for the Canadian plan for humanitarian reasons, and the peace of mind that more of my money is going to doctors and nurses, than to lawyers and administrators.