But that is pretty much what is happening in most cases where the docs don't get paid for counselling.
Ad ours with MCare and MCaid already.
Which the counselling wouldn't address. That is a different part of the process. It also happens now under private and governmental plans alike.
BEFORE in extremis situations would tend to suggest an ongoing process. At least every so many years (IIRC that is once every 5 years or so? Probably not often enough). I, for instance, already have the living will and durable power of attorney for health care filled out and ready to go. But those not intimately involved in the healthcare side, don't know about these things often and could use the suggestions and reminders.
Kurt Ullman wrote in news:kurtullman- snipped-for-privacy@70-3-168-216.pools.spcsdns.net:
That's between private insurers,you and your doctors.
At least you can negotiate or sue them;you can't with government.
EXACTLY. people seem to think that a National Healthcare System is going to be run better than the present Medicare and Medicaid? Crazy.
(or better than USPS,AMTRAK,NASA,Senate and House lunchrooms....)
"counselling" is a distraction; it's the *denial of treatments* that is the problem.
BTW,Obama has said he expects to drive private insurers out of the healthcare business,and that it would take 10-15 years to do it. It's a GOAL of Obama's to have only a "single payer" system. NO competition(with the resultant savings),no choice.
I agree. Especially since the two are not even remotely linked.
There are some interesting clauses that I find somewhat interesting in the House version of the bill. The MOST is that the government option (if it survives) would be specifically forbidden from negotiating with the providers. Rather, it would use the MCare reimbursement models which impose reimbursement on a take-it-or-leave-it basis. Since Mcare generally pays around 60 cents for every $1 paid by the Evil Insurance Companies, this would seem to be a VERY potent competitive edge that is magnified by the fact the government option is also denied the right to make a profit. The other thing is that if the loss ratio on any given year is higher than some artifically mandated standard, then all programs are required to refund it. However, the actuaries don't always get it right and the pay out rates can fluctuate. There is not method to capture more money if the ratio goes below what is approved.
Last time I remember the government being involved in end-of-life decisions was purely for political purposes in the Terry Schiavo case. The wonderful GOP (God's Only Proxy), in their devotion to "family values", sought to replace the husband of this poor woman to drive their "pro-life" political agenda. Their gang of TV preachers and one-issue radicals have driven this country to the brink of disaster. Where are the pro-lifers when innocent people are being executed by our grand governments? Schiavo's brain, as was predicted by the non-political side of the expert opinions, was damaged far more severely than others claimed and could not have functioned to provide the signs of conscious effort and response the mad-dogs claimed. The governor of Florida was on the brink of sending troops to invade the hospice being guarded by the county sheriff to keep the dead woman "alive" with feeding tubes....that would have been an interesting encounter.
Nobody seems to mention the potential savings in other areas if there was a public system for basic care....
Your new car might cost 20% less.
Scrap the Workers Comp system and just cover "work related" accidents and illnesses same as all others. Even without the crooks and ambulance chasers, I suspect that at least 50% of repetitive motion and back injuries are mostly the result of overweight and out-of-condition folks who lawyer up to get tax-free benefits. The waste in fighting to get a condition considered "work related" is horrendous. The crooks are sucking money right out of your pocket in monies that could be paid to good, honest people in wages.
I worked with one employer to change their company doctor .. even paid taxi fare for transportation to larger cities 40-100 mi. away...saved
100k the first year. The government isn't my enemy; it is crooked, lazy, irresponsible "neighbors" who want the maximum benefit for themselves, who want "someone else" to pay for it, and who consider themselves "conservative".
A lot of this is political, too. Shocked that I know you are. For instance, there are a whole list of diseases (COPD, cancers and even Parkinsons) that by statute are automatically work-related in firefighters. Others have similar carve outs.
Then you would be thinking wrong. Virtually all seminaries offer courses in chaplaincy. There are post-graduate (post-seminary?) degrees (certifications?) in institutional chaplaincy. Even if the spiritual counselor has not had the benefit of formal training, he's bound to have picked up a significant amount of knowledge on the subject through osmosis.
Secondly, to respond to your first point, I would hope a man of the cloth would put God or his fellow man ahead of mammon. I certainly would trust a minister, rabbi, priest, or imam more than I would some overweight bureaucrat from the "resources" department.
------- Aside:
My next door neighbor was the Jewish Chaplin to the Texas Medical Center. His primary duty was to deal with out-of-town Jews admitted to one of the fifteen or so hospitals in the center. Each day he would get a combined census of Jewish patients who didn't have a local rabbi and either he or one of his volunteers would visit each.
One of his more interesting responsibilities was to maintain a card file of local language resources since often patients from strange lands would land at one of the Center's hospitals. Jews come from all over the world and the project can be challenging. Guess how many local citizens in his card file spoke Coptic? (Two), Farsi? (over a hundred), Yiddish? (a lot).
Anyway, he was often called upon to provide end-of-life counseling, many times to patients and families not of his faith - much like a military chaplain.
Sooooooooo........? Railroaders once had special benefits as well. Members of Congress have special coverage. I have the right, at least, to the level of care provided MOC with my tax dollars. Work related, schmerk related. The coverage and WHO gets HOW MUCH is what is important, not the pocket it is pulled out of.
Kurt Ullman wrote in news:kurtullman- snipped-for-privacy@70-3-168-216.pools.spcsdns.net:
What do you think the "counselling" is for? It's to get the patient to accept the fact that they are being left to die,that they aren't getting further treatment,just drugs to numb the pain.
so private insurers would have to "compete" with the gov't,or buyers would naturally go with the cheaper "option",thus driving private insurers out of business.Also,doctors must accept providing their services at a loss,or pass the unpaid portion to others,raising their costs of care.(that's what happens now with healthcare...) OR,doctors leave the business,reducing available services and lengthening waits for care.That HAS happened in other countries.
WRT gov't healthcare not having to make a profit,it was never expected to. Just the opposite,it's expected to lose money,just like everything the gov't manages.
For most grandmas, the government is already paying the bills through Medicare. They don't have any death panels and haven't for over 40 years. Based on my experiences with my parents, Medicare would have pay for a whole lot more health care than they wanted.
The whole death panel thing and it's variants is pure scare tactics. I wish this discussion could be kept on a factual, rational plain. Yes, some of the people in favor of health care are using emotional tactics as well. "Evil profit making insurance companies."
Kurt Ullman wrote in news:kurtullman- snipped-for-privacy@70-3-168-216.pools.spcsdns.net:
Gee,you mean like Global Warming,now renamed "Climate Change"??
It appears politics trumps science there. Proponents certainly don't want any debate;they say it's already "fact",and Obama would go ahead with "Cap and Trade" despite any evidence that it would have any effect on the global climate,particularly when most other nations would not do the same regulation. But it WOULD provide government a HUGE amount of power over the economy and the US people.(while putting us back to lower living standards)
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