Here's One Element That Should Be In Any Healthcare Legislation
 

TORT REFORM!
I don't know exactly what the limitations might be to such reform. As a non-lawyer, I might suggest the following...

• A limit of $250,000 for any claim that does not involve a death or permanent disability.
• A limit of $500,000 for a claim involving a death or permanent disability.
• A requirement that the plaintiff pay the legal expenses of the defendant as well as the court costs if the case brought is unsuccessful.

Unless I've missed something very important, these three simple rules should slow down to flow of medical malpractice lawsuits considerably.

If nothing other than these simple rules were enacted into law, I'd think that he cost of healthcare would drop pretty dramatically. Maybe not enough--but pretty significantly.

Would that also apply to any claim initiated due to "death or permanent injury" where auto accidents, golf cart collisions, airplane crashes, use of firearms, or any other event was the underlying cause? Or is this strictly to provide legal protection only for hospitals and physicians?

And if the third item was law, why would there be any need for the first two?

No, Just For Doctors, Hospitals And Other Medical Providers
 

I'll restrain myself on tort reform. I just hope tomorrow's paper doesn't have another report of a jury awarding $144 million to some unemployed guy in the hills of Tennessee, who smoked since he was thirteen and now claims he wouldn't have lung cancer if the cigarette companies had warned him properly. After all, we should leave some way for the PI lawyers to make a living.

For a little while at least.

What happens when massive (or excessive in any manner per the insured) awards are by juries is always the same - and PI or any other kind of lawyer are always excused from sitting on juries (judges don't like to be critiqued in the jury room by any lawyer).

When a state court jury decides, with award, to the injured person, the one being sued (and insurance company, who normally defends) immediately appeals. Once the appeal is filed, the original decision (and award) is now on hold until the appeals court has ruled. This can take a couple years, depending on appellate docket. In the meantime, the injured party is no better off than the day day before the lower court decision. If the appellate court rules in favor of the injured party, the insured appeals to the next higher court (often, a state supreme court). That court too has a significant docket, so the clock keeps running. So, despite an original court decision, the injured person still doesn't have a dime all this time.

Enter the insured again - this time offering a deal: For an amount much lower than the original jury award), but paid immediately, the insured will drop all appeals. The injured party, with bills to pay, may haggle to some avail (usually not much) and take the deal. Insurers' negotiation range usually has a base (cost of future litigation, less a couple percent) and a ceiling (policy limit), with the goal to have the injured party take the former. All counsel (and the courts) know this, and it has been often insinuated that courts drag appeals to give the parties time to resolve the matter in pre-appellate settlement negotiations, as courts rarely want to place themselves in positions to reverse jury decisions.

So, payoffs of these jury awards which sound like a PowerBall winner, are rarer than hen's teeth. Thus, while the original jury award made great press, the actual cash exchanging hands is much less.

For some reason, knowing this doesn't make me feel any better...

I retired in 1996 and almost 20 years before that I was part of a tort reform group
 

trying to get enough constituents to get off their duffs to get after their lawmakers to reform the tort laws.....so here we are 30 + years later working on tort reform....:1rotfl:

Forty years ago we were on a kick for energy independence....get away from foreign oil dependence (our amount import now VS then has doubled) and so now we are doing what about energy independence? :1rotfl:

Health care reform is back from the 80's and 90's and today we are going to do what....cover everybody...what ever that means and costs...:1rotfl:

I do believe there is a pattern emerging. All POTUS say the same thing (promise and talk up a good game) results = nothing....reaction of we the people also nothing.

If you think Obama's speech on health care was a bomb (using the telepromter) you should have heard....both content (ridiculous) and delivery (no telepromter today just notes where he lost his place several times).

We are currently being spoon fed a diet of words. When they are wrong (as in health care or N. Korea)....the politicians rely on we the people....TO DO NOTHING.....and we sure do not disappointbarf

btk

Totally understandable. Not many things are as stressful as being a defendant in a lawsuit, and worse when the jury trial comes back with a lunatic-level award. Even knowing what the long-term outcome is going to be isn't comforting.

ABut, whenever one must rely on a "jury of your peers," it's never a good day.

If you think health care is expensive now........
 

wait until its free.

Sometimes bumper stickers offer profound insight into real life.

Obama Care
 

maybe I missed some earlier posts on health care but I must say
that I cannot believe that in a retirement community like TV
nobody has mentioned that in order to get the saving from Medicare
that Obama is talking about Medicare Advantage Plans that so many
Villages now have will be alot more expensive or go away altogether
Say so long to no or $20 per month premiums.

And by the way how will you feel about that prospect of not
getting or waiting months for the joint replacements, mri's cat scans
etc that we now take for granted. remember we are old and these things
don't pay off in the long run because we are going to die soon anyway.

Be ready to pay much more and get much less:cus:

rockaway you are right on target with your question.
 

I have been chiding for weeks whether those over 65 getting benefits from the government today....think they are not involved. There is no way to open health care up to everybody and us to keep what we have. They aren't going to give everybody what we currently have....we would have to start using numbers bigger than trillions. Therefore a system that is viewed as fair and eqitable by all the wizards in Washington will have to be a watered down version of today's benefits. Of course there will be supplements available at a price to get what an individual wants or needs to get back to where they were.

I do not understand why this is not a concern. It has to be the folks who have what they do today are taking comfort in the belief it does not involve them. Isn't this the main reason the new legislation excludes government employee benefits. They want to keep what they have...can it be any more obvious?

Well it will and they are in for a surprise.

And once again the silent majority will get what it deserves.

btk

I often wonder what the "polls" would look like if people realized that the care they receive today will not be the same in the future if these "reforms" go into effect. Does the term "watered-down" come to mind? All I can say is that I hope my knees and hips hold up. I exercise and walk an hour each day. Preventive medicine is the only recourse that I feel I have some control.

As a side note here's a little article about the company I work for. I actually work on the Take Care Health side of the company.

http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/...operation.html

Excellent! That's using American ingenuity rather than simply throwing money at an issue and hoping something positive occurs. Even better, they showed that following established business and scientific models - analyze, design, develop, prototype, evaulate, remodel, evaluate, beta test, evaluate, implement small-scale, evaluate, implement medium-scale, evaluate, implement large-scale, continue evaluation and revise accordingly - really works.

Beats the daylights out of writing a bill nobody reads, do a quick vote before anybody gets smart, and a select few make a fortune from taxpayer pain.

As always there are solutions other than government. CVS and others are doing similar projects. There are many promising things on the horizon for health care but I fear too many just roll over and expect the government to fix it which of course they never do and in fact always make it worse.

It's a simple question really.

Social Security - bankrupt
Medicare - bankrupt
Medicaid - bankrupt
Government treasury -bankrupt
Economy - toilet
Job market - trashed.
Stimulus - total failure

Why then does anyone in their right mind believe government can take over and run health care?

Why oh why don't people wake up?

Troubles
 

First, all anyone has to do is to look at the UK and Canadian health care programs to get a quick picture of what America can expect with a Gov't program. Second, when is America going to wake up that the person leading these charges is Pelosi who is from the State with more than 11% unemployment, bankrupt and getting worse as we speak. It continues to vilolate the illegal immigration laws (e.g.San Fran) and has a crime rate that is very high. If CA is the standard we are going after "look out". As the SS system starts to go belly up rather than trying to save it the investments are going towards an energy system (cap and trade) which will save 1.4M gallons of oil while China, which is the largest poluter of the world does not change. In cap and trade key on the "trade" as more jobs will be going overseas. Isn't it about time that America woke up and smelled the junk politics going on..?

Troubles
 

Whats wrong with Canadian Health Care??
The have the choice of either Provincial Health Care or if they have Company Health Plans they can subscribe to whichever one they want. True there are wait times, but this is true with almost everything, but their Health Care Expenses are paid for by whichever plan they have and they have Medicare in each Province.

Observations ?
 

You may be right. I am only going by what I read?

Socialized medicine has meant rationed care and lack of innovation. Small wonder Canadians are looking to the market

The failure of Canada's experiment with socialist medicine is readily apparent: long waiting lists and wait times for specialized services, conveyor-belt treatment for routine services, chronic shortages of family doctors and hospital beds, gross inefficiencies, slow innovation, stifling and wasteful bureaucracies, warring "special-interest" groups, and the exodus of good doctors to greener, freer pastures.

It's still illegal in Canada for private healthcare providers to compete with the government monopoly. Only North Korea and Cuba—two impoverished, brutal, communist dictatorships—still retain such restrictions. And there have been increasing accounts of Canadians suffering severe pain and even dying while waiting months or years for treatments that are readily available in countries that allow private healthcare.

Funny, that sounds in many ways like the system I work in..right here the U.S.

Interesting. Do you work in the health care system?

Sure do Keedy

Me too... but we do NOT have a "health care system"... In America we have a "health care industry"... it is a commodity. It is not a "system".

Absolutely correct.

Great Idea, But...
 

I think the Walgreens idea is terrific. If all the big companies in America did something similar, it seems to me that would go a long way towards making working people healthier and reducing the cost of healthcare.

But there are two key words in my complimentary statement..."big companies" and "working people".

If the idea of company-sponsored healthcare became common, that would be great. But the number of people it would affect would be too small, I think. How many people these days work for companies that can afford such a program? Even if they do work for a large company, do they work in an office of sufficient size to justify an on-site medical professional? Then there's the question of "working people". What happens when the employee who has grown to trust and depend on the company program gets laid off, quits or retires? What do they do then?

Overall, I think what Walgreens is doing is wonderful. But it a supplementary program, not the total answer to healthcare for the wide range of working and non-working Americans.

The idea with regard to Walgreen's is ok at best. The clinics like many other "minuite clinic" set ups are staffed primarily by nurse practitioners and are primarily (even according to their own site) for minor conditions such as colds, flu, upper respiratory track infections, and minor skin conditions. While any or all of these may be bothersome most don't require any treatment beyond symptomatic relief from over the counter medications. The setting provides decent potential for profitability because of just those reasons and the fact that an NP is paid less.
As much as it may be magnanemous and somewhat innovative on their part, it really does very little to address issues with our health care industry at large. It could be considered wasting resources by knowledgable people as is much of the rest of our system. What it does not address is the incredibly large problem of people with multiple co-morbidities (the diabetes, hypertension, high cholesterol, heart disease collection that so many have for example). There are also so many other things that a system like this can never adaquately address.
This for the most part is sort of "feel good" medicine that appeals the segment of society (pretty large I think) that thinks they need a doctor and a pill for everything or they just are not getting their money's worth. That's what I mean by waste.
I bring none of this up to knock their program, but to make sure some other aspects of it and the system at large are factored in.

I think a clinic like Walgreen could act as a good triage because an experiences nurse could detect things and advise patient to seek further help.
People with those ailments would probably already have their own source for treatment. they would not bother going there.

You could be right, though my experience tells me otherwise.

Many people use the emergency rooms as their prime care physician. These clinics are certainly less expensive then ER's. Have you ever seen an ER bill for a relatively simple procedure?
I do not have many answers to the health care situation but they say that 70% of treatments-ailments could have been avoided using preventative medicine.
Maybe some courses in high school could go a long ways.

I don't think there was an issue regarding whether these clinics would be cheaper than the E.R. Have I ever seen the the E.R. bill? Yeah, and then some. As a physician that has practiced in the E.R. setting and the inpatient hospital setting for some time now I feel fairly familiar with this. That really wasn't the thrust of my post though.

I don't know about your 70% statistic, might be pretty close though I'm not sure how that figure came about nor what all it refers to.

To reiterate, my point was not denigrate their plan, simply to shed more light and perspective on it.

OK..I didn't know you were a saw bone. My only medical experience was courtesy of the US army. In their infinite wisdom they determined that I would make a good combat medic. I was privy to many triage and ER type situations due to the many patients and few doctors. I had to do alot of on the job training.
As for the 70% figure..I have seen it many times in articles but could not really offer a link to anything official. I have seen it many times in real life, though. I have seen the effects of bad lifestyle choices. On the other hand, I have seen the smaller percentage, too. There are people who think they do everything healthy but still succumb to cancer, heart disease etc.
Still, I firmly believe in educating people on preventive medicine.

Could not agree more. Perhaps a little accountability along with the education? Do you get to keep getting repeat cardiac caths or bypass surgery if you continue to smoke? Do you get unlimited hospitalizations for continued alcohol abuse and it's complications if you refuse treatment for the addiction? Do you get another knee rplacement at age 50 if you didn't lose part of the 300 lbs that caused the first one? A lot of people don't care for this philosophy but I think it warrants discussion.

On a separate note, my thanks for your service to this country and my admiration for doing it in such a difficult role. Appreciate it.

And a sincere welcome. I know it is very difficult to change human behavior so more emphasis on preventative health at an earlier age seems prudent. Of course, I also believe that a course in basic business in high school should be mandatory. Knowing how to balance a checkbook and some simple investing would go further then algebra. IMHO

Again, speaking from my experience only, a very small select few will actually learn an attempt to participate in preventive care, because it too will require change and adhering to certain behaviors.

How many of you speaking with such venom about the Federal Government's inequitable distribution of wealth, and it's botching of all things federal willingly receive Medicare, Veteran's Benefits and Social Security?

If you've spent more on your Medicare than you've paid in- welcome to Socialism, as you define it. If you have received more Social Security than you paid in- welcome to socialism, as you call it.

It seems only fair to me, as a baby-boomer, that you should not get one penny more than you have put into our "Socialistic" systems. Isn't that what you're saying- as long as it's someone else?

Our Declaration states that "Life" is one of the cardinal responsibilities and gifts given by our creator. Somehow, it gets lost when that affects some greedy geezer's pocketbook.

Hmmmm Sounds like an anger issue to me. How about this? I will take every penny I put into it with compound interest since the government started taking it out of my paycheck and not ask for another dime. How's that? 46 years of my money earning interest. I'll take it and never ask my government for another "hand-out". OK? Oh yea, my wife has been self-employed for the last 22 years so she has been paying the Social Security tax of approximately 15 % I would like her's compounded too.
Oh, wait a minute..we had to pay for Johnson"s "War on Poverty." How did that work out? Oh yea, the government decided to "borrow" from the SS money to pay for that little expenditure....tell us again how many SS billions were borrowed for the infamous "War on Poverty"?
Oh...wasn't it the same administration that decided to borrow more money from social security to pay for the Vietnam war that a democrat started?
Let's see..who went over there to fight the Kennedy-Johnson War? Oh yea...THE GREEDY BABY BOOMERS. Imagine that.......

As far as Veterans Benefits go, they have been earned and many who receive them would gladly love to have the clock turned back and swap places with anyone who complains about the cost.

As far as Social Security goes, the odds of ever fully collecting back what has been placed into the fund are very long indeed.

As far as Medicare is concerned, have no idea whether what I've "contributed" to Medicare will match what I receive in care. Time will tell.

With regards to anyone in the previous generation(s) who do depend on Social Security, Medicare or anything else, before you condemn those "greedy geezers," first thank them for letting you grow up in freedom and not having to speak German, Japanese or Russian as your national language. They sacrificed a lot - more than most folk will ever appreciate - so that their progeny would not live under tyranny, and it's beginning to look like the subsequent "me first" generation(s) lack respect and appreciation.

Your points and the spirit you gave them in are well taken. I don't really hear anger, and you do make some valid points.

You could be right. Maybe anger is not the best description. Maybe...choler,ire,animosity,resentment. I tried to say "greedy geezer's pocketbook" a few times but kept getting this picture in my mind of a grouchy old man....probably my overactive imagination......Hmmmmmm

Almost Didn't Respond
 

As a "baby boomer" I am sure you worked hard, lived real frugal, maybe in a low rent area and did not have a car for a few years after you married as you were saving for a car and home when you could afford it !! I am sure you did not buy a car on credit and you financed only a portion of the home with the commitment that you would pay the mortgage before you tried to "trade up"?
That when you retired you paid cash for your home as you saved for retirement. When called on to support your community through personal commitments and need to work on its social programs, (e.g. United Way, Jaycees, YMCA, etc.) that you stepped up to the plate and dedicated a good portion of your time to better the community. And for 40-50 years you paid into SS and only accepted Medicare as a goverhment program to let some air out of the high costs for new equipment that was being brought to the medical field, (e.g. Cat Scans, MRI's, etc.) which was funded before the liberals decided to use the money for something else and then claim poverty.Life is good but before you challenge the "older generation" remember that we tried to live responsibility as I am sure some "baby boomers" have done and deserve credit for those that did.

I didn't ask to be in Social Security. I wasn't given a choice. I would much rather have had the money to invest the way I saw fit. Did you ever hear of the Galvestan Project? These people were allowed to opt out of SS. They put their money in bonds and annuities that had guaranteed fixed interest rates. They are getting considerably more money than if they had put their money in SS. Why does the government always think they know better how to spend our money???

Sally Jo....Can you tell me more about the Galvestan Project? I did a few searches but came up empty. It sure sounds interesting.