Spring 2017

Patients are asking: "What did you think about TrumpCare?" -- in short I thought it was an equal disaster for the country as is/was ObamaCare. As long as we have the inane necessity of sending bills for $100.00 worth of Primary Care services across the country to be assessed, adjudicated, chopped and diced by people who have never seen the patient nor bear any responsibility for their care - only to have it delayed, denied, or reduced for payment followed by the expectation that the practice
must turn around and bill the patient for the "authorized" amount of their co-pay or deductible ($7.00? 20.00?whatever? it is hardly worth the expense of billing 3-4 months after service) we will have excess waste and excess games playing by patients, payers, and providers.
It is ridiculous for
each physician on average to support two people in the insurance industry and another 1-2 in their own office just to get paid.
The same patients who are horrified if asked to pay their bill directly ("I
have insurance!") think of nothing of dropping $300.00 for groceries and sundries at Costco, or paying their cell phone or cable bill directly. The cost of care will only be controlled when patients have their
own cash in the game, paying directly to their providers up to some (perhaps slowly increasing) catastrophic level ($3000.00? $5000.00?) yearly. The marketplace will work just fine without the government or giant insurance companies distorting it. Tax favored Health Savings Accounts encourage that. Couple that with rarely used and thus cheap catastrophic only insurance sold to a national market and we have real reform. As an international traveler, I bought worldwide catastrophic coverage ($20,000 deductible) for only a few hundred dollars
per year.
Anything else is window dressing and special interest pandering. The country cannot afford what we have, and less so any of the "reforms" thus far offered. John Stossel says it well in the article below.
Free Market Health Care
Government involvement in health care drives prices up.
John Stossel March 29, 2017
President Trump and Paul Ryan tried to improve Obamacare. They failed.
Trump then tweeted, "ObamaCare will explode and we will all get together and piece together a great healthcare plan for THE PEOPLE. Do not worry!"
But I do worry.
Trump is right when he says that Obamacare will explode. (
continued here)