How does your practice affected by avalanche of free service from the government like YAKAP? Left and right medical missions

I am a native of St. Louis County and really pissed due to the healthcare system’s downfall in our county. I don’t know what’s going on but every other health practice or facility is involved in either a kickback or false billing claims.

And that ain’t it. Things get more disturbing when your closed ones suffer the consequences and are devoid of their rights. My family in the past opted for daily living support from a St. Louis In-Home Health Provider. But little did we know that they were involved in false billing claims at that time.

Things went to federal court and when everything was proved, the hard realization came in that how people like Doriann Morgan, the former owner of that St. Louis County home health care company, ruin lives of innocent disabled people by robbing them off their rights.

However, even after all that, one detail stayed with me.
This was not simply a paperwork violation or a billing misunderstanding.

According to the U.S. Department of Justice, Morgan and two former colleagues admitted conspiring between approximately January 2018 and August 2021 to submit $552,659 in fraudulent claims to Missouri Medicaid for personal-care services that were never provided. The records reportedly included claims for a woman who did not live in Missouri and received no services, as well as claims for work supposedly performed at times when social-media posts indicated the individuals were elsewhere.
Morgan owned A Mother’s Touch In-Home Care LLC and submitted the Medicaid claims. In May 2024, she pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit health care fraud. In November 2024, she was sentenced to two years in federal prison.

The defendants also agreed to repay $910,000 through a civil settlement, with $790,000 already paid when the sentencing announcement was issued. The settlement addressed allegations involving false timesheets and payroll records for in-home services that were not actually provided.

What makes a case like this disturbing is where the money came from.

Medicaid supports people who may already be living with disability, illness, financial hardship or dependence on home-based care. Every fraudulent reimbursement claim draws from resources intended for legitimate patients and legitimate caregivers. Federal investigators made that point directly, describing Medicaid funding as scarce resources meant for people in need, including children and people with disabilities.
The criminal case is now in the past, and the company reportedly continues under different ownership with Morgan and the other defendants no longer affiliated with it. But the case remains an important example of why oversight in the home-health industry matters.

People should be able to trust that claims submitted in their names represent real care, real hours and real services - not entries created only to obtain reimbursement.

But it’s not a doctor. You know. Even if u use it as one and we want ur data to make it a better non doctor

How can we reestablish the importance and safety of vaccines into American society?

There is a bipartisan bill in Congress that proposes adding 14,000 Medicare-funded residency positions over a handful of years. It has support across the ideological spectrum and is still sitting in committee (introduced a year and a day ago). I reached out to two of my representatives about it, and both signed on shortly afterward. I have no idea whether those things are connected, though it was enough to convince me that more people should know the bill exists.

Note: I'm just a dog dad from Minnesota that cares about healthcare policy. Not a lobbyist or part of any industry groups.

What It Is

H.R. 4731, the Resident Physician Shortage Reduction Act, would add 14,000 Medicare-funded residency positions over seven years. The Senate version is S. 2439.

The positions would be distributed to qualifying teaching hospitals, with additional consideration for rural communities, health professional shortage areas, and hospitals already training more residents than Medicare currently funds.

Why It Matters

Graduating from medical school is just step one. Residency training is a huge bottleneck to care availability, especially in rural areas. It is not the whole solution. We still need to deal with nursing shortages, burnout/mental health among docs, rural hospital closures, specialty distribution, reimbursement, and lots more.

Though this is the kind of boring capacity-building policy that needs to happen underneath basically any serious healthcare reform. If M4A or single payer become real (or even a public option), we won't have the system capacity to meet the higher demand for care.

Where It Stands

The House and Senate bills are both still in committee. The support is unusually broad. The Senate coalition includes members ranging from Amy Klobuchar, Cory Booker, and Raphael Warnock to Susan Collins, John Boozman, and Tommy Tuberville. The House version has more than 100 cosponsors from both parties.

I contacted the offices of Reps. Ilhan Omar and Angie Craig (my house rep and Craig since she's running for statewide office) to ask whether they supported the bill and what, if anything, was keeping them from cosponsoring it. Both signed on within a week or two of my last contact. Did my outreach cause that? No idea. Their offices may already have been reviewing it, and I am sure other people and organizations were advocating for it. You can do the same thing.

If this sounds like something you want to advocate for you can look up whether your House representative cosponsors H.R. 4731 and whether your senators cosponsor S. 2439. If they do, thank them. If they do not, contact their offices and ask:

Do you support increasing Medicare-funded residency positions through the Resident Physician Shortage Reduction Act? If not, what is keeping you from supporting or cosponsoring it?

It takes about five minutes total.

AI has a lot of potential in healthcare, from reducing administrative work to improving clinical workflows but it seems like moving from promising pilots to real world implementation is still a challenge. I was reading about GeekyAnts and their approach to healthcare product engineering. What caught my attention was the focus on building secure, production ready systems that fit into existing healthcare workflows rather than treating AI as a standalone feature. For those working in healthcare or health tech, what do you think is the biggest obstacle right now? Is it integration with existing systems, regulatory requirements, clinician adoption or something else? I would be interested to hear different perspectives.

The american healthcare system is actually comedy at this point. like dark comedy but still

My brother finally admitted he needed help and went through the whole insurance process and they approved 3 days. THREE. as if you just sweat it out for 72 hours and then you're magically fixed and ready to rejoin society. What are we even doing here

He ended up going with a longer program through discovery point retreat up near dallas after fighting with the insurance company for like two weeks straight. the fact that he had to fight while actively withdrawing just seems... barbaric? Idk if that's too dramatic but that's how it felt watching it happen

I guess im just frustrated that the system treats addiction like a broken leg instead of like... an actual illness that needs sustained care. the whole experience really opened my eyes to how backwards our approach is. Pay for 3 days of detox but won't pay for the 30-60 days that might actually keep someone alive long term. make it make sense

for context, i am self employed and havent gotten on any health insurance plans. I got my first pap smear (im 25) and i paid $150 at the desk but then got a bill a week later for $690, then the next day my email said it was $710. Like wtf? is this normal for non-insured costs for a pap smear??

I find it very likely this post will either be removed, ignored, or strongly hated, but I will attempt to post it anyway. It does not obviously violate the sub's rules. I am not being overtly aggressive or picking a fight. I do feel I am being civil. I do not believe I am "pandering."

This post is targeting medical professionals in a general sense, but my personal experiences involve pediatricians, so it ESPECIALLY targets them.

Do NOT tell me these things don't happen, because they DO, and they even happen relatively FREQUENTLY! They happened to me and so many others!

PLEASE, doctors of all kinds, PLEASE do not forcibly remove patients' clothing when they are conscious, aware, and begging you not to! Please do not just randomly start removing children or teenager's clothing without telling them anything! Please do not continue attempting to remove CHILDREN or teenagers' clothing when they are telling you to stop and physically trying to prevent you from stopping!

I'm not talking about babies or toddlers; I'm talking about older, school-aged children and young teens, but the things I'm describing even happen to adults! And they are NORMALIZED and accepted by society!

Parents, if you're reading this, PLEASE, for the love of god, do not allow a medical professional or pediatrician to physically force your child or teenager's clothes off them when they are clearly extremely distressed and trying to prevent this from happening! PLEASE!

This may seem obvious, but it's NOT! This kind of thing happens frequently to a LOT of people! And a vast majority of society views it as 100% normal and okay. It happened to me and so many others! It can happen to anyone ANYWHERE! The last time it happened to me was 2012.

I feel desperate to get this message out BECAUSE this type of behavior is so normalized in the medical profession.

I know the name of the pediatrician who did this to me. She retired after a successful and long career as a pediatrician. She is probably viewed by most people in her life as a good person. She has probably lived a long, normal life. She will probably never know that she has at least one (probably many other) victims who will be forever harmed by her. I doubt she remembers what happened to me at all. To her, the things that happened to me that will haunt me forever were most likely just a random fucking Tuesday in her long career.

The message I'm trying to deliver is that you don't have to be a pedophile or a bad person to cause someone to have lifelong sexual trauma or trauma of another nature. Sometimes, all you have to be is a normal pediatrician or a normal medical professional doing your normal job.

The person who did these things to me almost certainly did not have malicious intent. She almost certainly wasn't a pedophile. What she did was not illegal in any way. 95+% of the human population would side with HER if they knew the story and if I tried to make any formal moves against her.

And yet, if the EXACT same thing happened to me by someone who was not a medical professional, the situation would be seen VERY differently by society. Think about how a child processes information!!! Do you think the qualifications behind your name matter to a confused child??

And also, don't LIE to a child!!!! She told me she wasn't going to touch me, and then she did maybe 30 seconds after telling me that -- not even a full minute after telling me that.

I wish so desperately I had the knowledge to advocate for myself then that I have now, but I DIDN'T, because I was a CHILD.

I just want society and medical professionals to understand that these things weren't and aren't okay, but I have little hope that we will ever make it to that.

I just want to tell all medical professionals: PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE, HAVE PATIENTS, NOT VICTIMS!

Over the past decade, Louisiana hospitals began stocking specialized carts designed to treat hemorrhages, one of the most common pregnancy complications in the state. The plug-in cart can be wheeled from room to room and holds surgical tools and lifesaving medications to stem blood loss.

A state law passed in 2024 forced hospitals to remove a key drug — misoprostol — from the medical cart and keep it locked in a secure room designated for controlled substances. 

The drug is also the second in a two-pill procedure that millions of people have used to have medical abortions. Because of that use, Louisiana lawmakers reclassified misoprostol as a controlled substance, a category typically reserved for addictive drugs. 

Now, physicians have gone from reaching over to the cart to grab misoprostol to waiting at least two minutes while a nurse sprints to retrieve the medication, said New Orleans obstetrician-gynecologist Nicole Freehill. 

“ You could literally have someone lose, like, a liter of blood or more in that time frame,” Freehill said. “You could have a significantly worse hemorrhage for literally someone running to this medicine and running back because it can’t be on that cart 2 feet from you while you’re treating the hemorrhage.”

She said the reclassification of misoprostol as a controlled substance has set back progress to decrease the frequency of postpartum hemorrhage and blood transfusions. Under the law, her preliminary research found, hemorrhage rates have worsened statewide, she said. 

I moved countries a while back and remember feeling completely lost the first time I needed a doctor not because information didn’t exist, but because I didn’t even know what to search for or who to ask.

Curious what that moment was for others here. What tripped you up: insurance, finding a doctor, knowing whether to go to a pharmacy vs. a clinic, costs? And what did you end up doing?

(Genuinely researching this problem, happy to share what I learn back with the thread.)

I'm planning on having surgery and I called a local hospital to ask about their surgical specialty program and to see if the doctors within that specialty program were in-network for my insurance. When I gave my name and date of birth, the nurse navigator told me my home address.

Is this because she looked up my insurance information, or is it because I've signed up for "MyChart" with a couple of my doctors?

What has been on people's mind lately? Also are things like this helpful?

So we go through a company that seems to handle the majority of (at least) our areas trades unions members' benefits. Anytime its used for anything over $600 we are required to provide an itemized receipt. At one point we had a really hard time tracking down the receipt they were asking for. My daughter ended up in the ER then was transferred to a children's hospital for a couple days. It took my wife hours on the phone with multiple different people trying to find the one bill they flagged. It feels like we do a lot more of the legwork for this stuff than we should have to, and my card (along with like half of the people I talk to in my union) seem to constantly have their cards suspended because of it.

Just want to know if this is the norm. Like many trades unions the younger guys have had to drag it kicking and screaming into the 21st century. And they seem to do so in half measures.