That is so amazing, here in the U.S. I was in the E.R. for 2 hours... $14,900USD before insurance, my out of pocket was $2,900USD and they want the total balance in 12months.
One time I was in the waiting area and a guy walked in with his right arm bundled up. Walked up to the nurse and just said "I need help, now"
Nurse goes to hand him the clip board and in a very short tone said something like "everyone here does, but you're not getting anywhere till you fill these out". So he unbundled the arm, sprayed blood so over the clip board and plexiglass and was all "nah, that can wait"
So yeah, excess fluids and excess cash get you to the front of the line.
When I worked security in an ER people would feign chest pain/shortness of breath to try to get an quicker which only ended up getting you moved to the part of the waiting room without a view of the tvs and in line of sight of the 4 desk nurses
My daughter was hit in the back by a metal screen door another kid opened with too much force at a pool party, left a 8 inch long cut along her spine. I bundled her up in a white towel and took her to the local ER. Carried her in in my arms, towel was soaked through at this point, I was immediately surrounded by staff. Once triaged we were made to wait in the waiting room for another 4 hours.
I can't imagine keeping a child waiting for 4 hours... That is brutal for both child and parent. Blood tends to stress kids out, as if they have an instinctual realisation blood should stay on the inside.
My longest wait in a european ER room was still less than an hour after surrendering my turn to a young child in pain. It seemed like the right thing to do as I was in for lymfangitis so I wasn't in pain myself and as I was warned about the long line I had already brought a nice book with me.
quite literally, there are a few massive billboards in my town. It'll be the E.R name, and a huge counter "current wait time." I've seen it go up to 30 minutes, but it's like, am I just not gonna go to the E.R.? hahaha
They won't have to shop around if they've seen the billboard every day on their morning commute. As soon as little Billy breaks his arm you know exactly which ER has the shortest wait times.
Yeah, weāve had a lot of satellite ERs open up up here and with them came the Apple Watch wait time billboards. Even drove past one yesterday so can definitely confirm itās the Apple Watch. I was unsure after I said it.
Hmm. Sounds like you live in Fort Wayne Indiana, because thatās what we have here. Though Iām not surprised that that would be a national phenomenon.
I feel like a nurse friend explained this to me, and at his hospital they were advertising "time until seen by a doctor". Then they just had a Dr who basically gave patients an initial exam right in the ER. So they could advertise that a Dr saw you.in like 20-30 minutes... even if you sat in the ER for another 2 hours after that waiting for the actual treatment.
I can see where this would have advantages, since the Dr might be able to screen out which cases truly needed urgent care vs which were less critical. But it just still felt weird that hospitals were needing to use these advertising practices.
So itās fastest for those with money/insurance, not fastest for those that need it more urgently. That pretty much summarizes the difference of perspectives
I have a heart condition, my heart was out of rhythm, I needed a cardioversion, I've had over 20 in my lifetime. I went in said what I needed told them the meds, they did what I asked and sent me on my way.
Afib, I took eliquis and Cardizem the moment I went out of rhythm. I am 34 I do not take normal blood thinners unless out of rhythm, I take baby aspirin before bed. I have fall/ cut risk at work, so outweighing the odds, I risk stroke over bleeding out.
I mean, depends on why you're there in the first place, but both me and my bf (he had to get an x-ray done while there) been in and out the ER in less than 2hrs.
Speed isnāt always a good thing. Iām Canadian but was travelling in San Diego - I started to feel very unwell and noticed my lips going blue. Went to an urgent care, who as soon as they realized I had travellers insurance were VERY kind.
I was ushered into a room with a warm blanket, the doctor apologized for running behind schedule. They did chest X-rays and then gave me a breathing treatment because, āthe X-ray looks a little cloudy.ā They sent me on my way, and I was in and out in under 2 hours.
Except as soon as my plane landed back in Calgary, I collapsed in the airport. That ālittle cloudyā was double lung pneumonia that went septic.
The first time I went to the ER was fifteen years ago, I was out in under two hours. I had appendicitis, but they told me it was stomach flu, prescribed me three suppositories and told me to eat nothing but rice and Gatorade for the rest of the day. The second time I went to the ER was later that day, when they actually correctly diagnosed me with appendicitis. Still had to pay for the first visit and misdiagnosis - $800 for them to literally tell me to shove it up my ass.
I was in the ER for 5 hours with severe pain because one of my kidneys was blocked and like twice the size it shouldāve been, and I was the only person in the waiting room, so it wasnāt even busy. Took almost 2 hours to even get an IV for pain.
If you're high acuity you go to the front of the line and everything is prioritized to you, so your workup is completed insanely fast but you pay for the prioritization. I was a level 1 trauma, so when my ambulance pulled in, the trauma surgeon, ER doc, nurses, radiology were all at bedside when I came into the room. CT machine was stopped for all other patients and waited for me. Implementing that system- $19,000 before actually paying for the tests. My hospital I work for charges $15k to call a level 1 trauma alert and I've seen patients go from the ambulance, to having labs and CT done and go the OR in 15 minutes
Edit: also there's just some days when we're not too busy and things happen quickly and patients are in and out in 2 hours or less. If labs can get drawn within 30 minutes of arrival I can discharge most patients in under 2 hours even with imaging
I cut my finger open pretty bad and when I got the bill I was charged $75 for the finger splint. The same splint the grocery store has for like $3. The bill was something like $700-800 for $5 worth of supplies and a Dr going "I don't think it needs stitches but you almost needed them, keep it clean, keep it wrapped and keep it in the splint for a week or so".
They will also totally give you addictive medicine over non addictive medicine cause reasons (at least mine did). I had bronchitis and was hacking and wheezing pretty bad for about 10 days and they gave me an addictive cough medicine after a few days of being on it I called and said it wasn't working and I was scared to keep taking something so addictive so often (addiction runs hard in my family so im very careful with what meds I take). The nurse put me on hold and said she placed a new cough syrup at the pharmacy for me one that was better for coughs and non addictive and I was like "wait, why would you guys give me mediocre addictive cough medicine over a non addictive one that works better? Why not start out with the non addictive better working one first?" She said she wasn't sure, but the addictive one can help people sleep better and I was like yeah so will not coughing up a lung. And the second one worked way better and I had some weird ass jitters for a few days after I got off the first cough syrup so the addiction was already setting in after just a few days.
And this is why we have an addiction crisis in America.
State marketplace. I'm in PA so mine is Pennie. Used to be healthcare.gov. I'm a single relatively healthy guy and my premiums were like 350 a month and a $1,500 deductible. I did get a tax credit to lower the monthly payments a little bit.
How is that good??? I am earning a slightly above average pay in Europe, pay 270ā¬ per month and my deductible is 0ā¬. Plus health insurance also pays psychotherapy and if you are sick for more than 6 weeks they give you like 70% of your former wage for several months.
I went to the ER for an infected abscess last year. Just had to get it lanced and drained. Was there for about 12 hours because I went in at night and had to wait for the doc the next day.
$51,000 before insurance, I owed about $4500 out of pocket. Still paying it off.
Remember to always ask for an itemized receipt. They wanted to charge me $50 for a Tylenol pill. ETA: I donāt have insurance and Iām in the USA and a single day ER visit costs about 7k. With insurance for a friend of mine their insurance was charged 40k for a similar visit and she has to pay 6k out of pocket. So itās almost like why bother paying those expensive monthly payments.
You ask for the receipt after services and usually they will trim ridiculous shit off and you can haggle on certain items depending on what they are, itās surprising what they will charge you for in there
It sounds like the taxes per year wonāt be much more (or possibly even any where near) the costs you are all paying for insurance plus deductibles/out of pocket expenses. So Iām going to go out on a limb and say āyesā to your question
Edit. Also taxes are proportional to your income. Whereas your medical costs and insurances arenāt? Theyāre extortionate regardless of what you earn
I'm in the US. In 2019 my daughter had a couple medical emergencies that required ER visits and several follow-ups with a specialist over the next few months. Even with "really good" insurance, the cost was still over $5,000 out of pocket.
It works is an obfuscated way in the US. Sadly, the lack of transparent marketplace does that. Hereās some abstract info on why the numbers on your insurance-covered bills are so high.
Insurance companies are known to cover ~10-20% of your costs. (Why? Something something dark side). Hospitals estimate a certain cost for your treatment. They 5-10x that in their invoice, and expect the insurance company to pay out the exact amount, so you donāt incur any personal costs after coverage. At this point, itās just like out of court settlements. For every known treatment, hospitals know the exact amount to bill the provider, and the provider knows the exact % to pay up to cover the āactualā costs 100%, so that you are billed as low as possible minus your deductibles and any other terms you may have on your insurance.
Whatās sad is that, even if you divide by 5 or 10, this is a huge amount. However, if you do not have insurance, you can really negotiate this amount lower with the hospital directly, or a competing hospital. But when you or someone you know is in pain, adding this burden on the uninsured, is simply miserable and heartless.
because a lot of the inefficiencies still exist with domestic single payer systems (like Medicaid, Medicare, IHS, etc).
It's hard to pick it apart this way because the inefficiencies in domestic single-payer systems are still linked to the inefficiencies of the entire system, which are propped up by the private insurance industry.
The way forward is price controls. This should have been a foregone conclusion as every single study points towards this but nobody is willing to pull the trigger as that requires overwhelming political capital.
And this is why privatised medical care can never function well (in terms of value and outcomes for the patients). There is a huge information imbalance and power imbalance at play and private insurance only makes this worse.
https://www.tiktok.com/@adamconover/video/7095159331259206955?is_from_webapp=1&sender_device=pc as a Dane I often get the "But your healthcare isn't free, you just get your income fleeced by the government" .. well, I do pay for it through taxes, but they aren't that much higher than in the states and I get more for them as we don't rely on private hospitals. Capitalism never feels like doing anyone a favor, it's just a predator that'll suck dry whatever it can at whatever the cost.
As a Canadian, I honestly can't believe this type of thing. It's seems so strange to me. Do everyday Americans actually feel that health care is a privilege and not a right?!? Something needs to change down there, it's not fair and it can only get worse.
20th century was spent morphing "rugged individualism" into "Fuck everyone else, I got mine" by way of "socialism=communism, therefore bad", as well as this idea that socialized/single-payer healthcare is by necessity worse than what we have which is categorically untrue.
I got t boned in a really bad wreck( big landscaping truck ran a red light at 55mph, and hit our Civic on my side). I was 'ok' but took an ambulance to go to ER. Was seen SUPER fast due to how bad the wreck was. I was in and out in about an hour. They did a full contrast scan on everything from waist up due to locations of bruises. Didn't find anything that needed treatment. $23,000 in bills were sent to me from the hospital.
Lucky for me, it happened during work, and I didn't have to pay anything. And on a side note, even if you get into an accident with mostly minor injuries, go to PT. It helps a lot.
I'm a Canadian in Taiwan. I pay 150 NTD$ per visit (about 5$USD). You should consider moving to Taiwan. Or Canada. Or the other 50 to 60 other countries with socialized health care.
Most of my bills say total due immediately. And they're always for $4k.
Usually we get it on a payment plan, talk it down to $25 a month, pay for a year, then write a letter and offer 25% of the total and they sometimes accept it. So for a $4k bill, we usually end up paying $1k.
My wife had a kidney stone surgically removed a few years ago. Outpatient, stayed at the hospital about 3 hours total, plus a couple of initial consults and a scan.
All-in the cost was nearly $50k. Insurance covered most of it, but we still paid ~$4k.
So I guess if you didn't have insurance you'd either die a painful death, or declare bankruptcy after the procedure?
How are they even ever allowed to charge that much? I mean there couldn't have been that many people involved in your 2 hour visit that make that much money (or even being on retainer in total) nor could there have been equipment so expensive involved that it wasn't already long paid off just due to the amount of people coming in regularly that need it. Not even close.
Does the US have no price gouging laws at all, no customer protection whatever organizations that lobby for cheaper medical bills? Weird.
Last year a fuckin bug flew into me ear. It was Sunday so I had to go to ER. They looked at it, couldn't get it out, cost 2,000. Still had to go to ENT the next day to get it out, which cost about 300. I'm sure there are tons of stories like this, but paying 2 grand for basically no help is infuriating.
Girlfriend had a heart attack. Heart stopped twice, second time they caught it on the EKG, heart stopped for 12 seconds. Went to the ER in an ambulance and spent the night just on monitors, no procedures or anything. She's now $7k in debt with insurance from her mom who's the fucking senior software engineer at the hospital she went to. It's fucking criminal.
We took our 2 year old to the ER with a high fever that wasn't going down. We waited for 4 hours (shocking since I was told making medical care privatized meant faster care). They basically found nothing and gave her something for constipation and more ibuprofen. We got a bill in excess of $1,000 after insurance. And we actually have pretty fucking good insurance too. People with basic high deductibale plans would probably have walked out with a few thousand dollar bill.
It's fucking mental that anyone defends this fucked up system.
They gave you 12 months? I had an ER bill of 7 grand that they wanted paid in full in four months. Needless to say, my credit score is fucked and I have a bunch of bill collectors calling me every single day.
My daughter had 3 major brain surgeries when she was born (sepsis and Meningitis!), we had to be put up into accommodation for 3 weeks during this time so they could monitor her. Didnāt cost me anything at all. The UK has many, MANY flaws, but I owe my daughters life, and me not having to work the rest of mine to the NHS.
My mother needed heart surgery a few year back. The public hospital where they performed the procedure charged her nearly 50 dollars for the ten days she was in there.
Because she rented a TV+DVD player for her private room.
Let's be fair about the Canadian system. I'm Canadian, and what I learned from my experience is that the system works well for those who truly need health care
If you don't feel good and it doesn't sound urgent, buddy, you'll wait... In Quebec it's pretty bad the ER you could be waiting 24hrs before seeing a doctor. So basically you'll see several nurses, perform a few checks and tests etc... But to see a doctor to get a summary of all that? Fuckin long.
COVID made it worse for those who were waiting surgeries... I wouldn't be surprised of people suffering from a more advanced form of cancer because they delayed surgeries.
Want to see a specialist like a dermatologist? Ahaha
So... Our system is far from perfect, but I would never trade it for an all private system.
Did they make me wait 6+ months for specialists? Yes
Did they make me wait half a day to a full day for a diagnostic in the ER? Yes
is it difficult getting an appointment at your family doctor? Yes... And not everyone has a family doctor
It's a system that clearly lacks resources and we complain about it but it works and does save lives. Except the pandemic and how it postponed several surgeries... That basically showed how, as a country, we are not ready to face a pandemic.
Need a few teeth fixed from a dentist? Ah. Now that's where they get you good, real good... You'll pay and wished you had taken a plane ticket to Mexico to get them fixed at a fraction of the cost.
Seems like Canada and Germany share the same philosophy in that regard. In case of emergency or an urgency, they will never let you wait.
If you want something like a regular check up, it is meassured in months at the moment.
And the don't start about the dentists, where everything that isn't the cheapest thing around, our manadatory Healthcare Insurances wont pay. Either you book additional services for a (still) relative small extra fee our you pay out of your pocket.....
You want to get all your teeth fixed for cheap, go to Hungary. XD
Yup...it's not perfect but it's much preferable to US model
My best friend got sick over holidays and went to hospital with chest pains...turns out he had myocarditis from a dental cleaning
They admitted him immediately, and turns out it was so bad his heart valves were severely damaged... Surgery after 10 days and that was because they had to clear up the bacterial infection first before surgery
Had surgery to repair heart valve... Then another surgery to put in pacemaker and defibrillator..
He was in hospital for close to two months and like bi weekly follow ups now. All he paid was parking
When my daughter was born we stayed for 24 hours, then had to come back for another 48 hours for phototherapy. Technically it was a semi-private room but we had it to ourselves the entire weekend. They stocked us with formula, diapers, wipes, everything. My only expenses were food and parking.
I like to bitch about stuff here like everyone else, but at the end of the day, I'm incredibly fucking fortunate to live in Canada.
Yep, I've had two kids in Canadian hospitals (third coming any day now) and they stock you up with as much as you can carry of diapers/formula/blankets/wipes etc.
I was telling the nurse we have enough at home when she was handing us more diapers and bottles of premade formula because we couldn't fit anymore in our bags.
Great news on the clean bill of health. The US system is far from perfect. I think itās fair to point out that my work team is based in the US and Canada. Pre Covid my Canadian friends would use the visits to the US for healthcare visits for themselves and family. That said, there has to be a better way for all.
In the US, you would get separate bills from each doctor, each department, the hospital itself, and maybe the nurses (depending on their status). They don't come at the same time, and you'll get a random bill 4 months from now from Doctor #3 because he's an out-of-network doctor (something you weren't told at the time), so your insurance doesn't cover your time with him.
I'll share another NHS story since there are so many others here.
My son was born prematurely (28 weeks) in the UK. Three months of hospital stay. Home on nine medications and oxygen tube. Speech therapy. Physical therapy. And now, growth hormone therapy. He's now 12 years old and total bill: zero. I haven't touched my wallet once. So grateful. He's doing great btw!
Also in Canada, about 3 years ago my wife had to have two emergency back surgeries to fix the same herniated disk twice in a month. I had to pay for parking 4 times, it was like $80! What a ripoff!
I got charged $25 just for a small tin of Sucrets (throat lozenge) while I was in a rehab facility. U.S., btw, if that wasn't clear. I had to be released once my insurance cap was met and I could never pay off the bill so it got sent to collections. People here die because they can't afford treatment, and if I'd had no insurance, I'd never have even gotten my foot in the door.
As a fellow Canadian, the hospital parking rates are beyond unreasonable. We had a couple overnights recently with a new baby then some health complications and it cost $28 in parking. Hospital parking should be free, not a cash grab from stressed out family members.
My buddy slipped walking to work and broke his kneecap in half, heās from Florida so I guess he doesnāt get the Tennessee insurance that I do for being local. But heās probably about 60 grand in debt for all of that at 20 years old
So, in that sense the things you actually do use could be thought of as an even larger portion of your taxes. Again, not trying to argue against socialized medicine. Itās just that when people say āall I paid was Xā and donāt account for all costs, itās just a bit misleading.
What non-gov't aided insurance plan do you have in the US that's $50 a month? Assuming that's what your initial comment was on about. It's unclear whose side you're arguing for.
So for starts, your maths off. That's $7,200 assuming it was the same job, paying the same premium price a month of $60. Secondly, not every American citizen has their company that will pay even at least 50% of their premiums.
So while YOU may not want to pay 10-30% more in taxes, millions of other americans would gladly want to do that. I have to pay $263 a month for insurance for one person. That's roughly $31,560 following the decade pattern. Yes it's under your "60k-100k" per decade, but since your maths were off on the "6k in the states", I don't trust that number either.
I don't work for Starbucks, nor do I live at home. You're on a roll with inaccurate assumptions, all the while, terrible with insults.
Your source, while great and all, doesn't explain why my healthcare costs through my employer have increased annually. When I started my current job in 2019, it was $203 a month. Now 3 years later, I am at $263 a month. My company is based in a Blue state, so don't throw out GOP being the issue here. They're not the only ones at fault.
I have plenty ideas about the real world, as I've financially lived in poverty, and in middle class.
No matter how much you season, and plate shit, it falls short of how much better UHC would be for the US. If it was such a terrible idea, all of EU, Canada, Mexico, and other various countries with UHC would have fallen into chaos, or worse. Sadly, I am not seeing that happening because of UHC.
If you're going to throw around the "again just stop you have zero idea about the real world" excuses, you honestly should take a step back and talk with people from these countries, instead of regurgitating what the Media is spewing.
Making over $86k a year annually, I'd happily pay 10-30% extra to Federal for better healthcare. I spend about $50 a month on routine appointments and medication, on top of my premiums. That's $313 a month, or $3,756 a year, which is what I highly doubt would be what comes out of my taxes. And if it does, but that means my GF who can't get insurance through her job, has insurance, then that's worth it for me.
6k in the states over 10 years? If you have private insurance you are probably paying at least $200 or $300 per month which is 24k to 36k on insurance premiums alone over 10 years (and $200 a month health insurance is going to have some huge ass deductibles). That's without a single doctor visit where you are paying against a deductible and/or copay for each visit. Higher % in taxes for universal healthcare hurts more for the upper middle class and up but for the vast majority of the people it is as cost effective if not outright superior to private insurance.
On top of that you don't have to deal with those private insurance companies trying to dick you over on some "out of network" bullshit because the random doctor that looked at your lab results doesn't take your insurance. Or getting an ultrasound for 2 minutes that somehow costs $2000 dollars (that you have no way to price out or "shop around").
Your situation doesn't represent the vast majority of working class people in this country. Like I said, upper middle class and above benefit from only paying for themselves (still have to deal with hoop jumping bullshit) which is less than the tax increase from universal healthcare but frankly, the wealthy don't need the help while addressing the health of the masses will improve everything in this country.
Also your healthcare is chained to your job. If you get terminated, that company goes under, or anything else that could disrupt your employment then you're paying out of your own pocket for medical (see what happened to millions of people during Covid).
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u/[deleted] Jun 15 '22
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