THEY'RE TRYING TO KILL US? THEN WHO'LL BUY THEIR SHIT??!

they're not trying to kill us, it happens because if they cut corners they make more profit.
and mostly the poor die so how much can they pay any way.

Frank Cross: I'm gonna give you a little advice Claire. Scrape 'em off. You wanna save somebody? Save yourself.
Claire Phillips: Oh well that's a really nice attitude. Merry Christmas.
Frank Cross: Bah humbug. 

Let me be very clear, Moonpie: Private clinics cannot and do not provide any pubically-insured services to Canadians for profit. The services that private clinics in Canada provide are strictly elective, and private clinics cannot bill a patient for a service that is insured by our government; they have to charge the government.

Unsurprisingly, there is profit in selling elective care to rich people, so private clinics are opening up.

But the opening and success of private clinics is in no way a reaction to people dying on waiting lists, nor was the court's finding that private clinics were being unlawfully banned a reaction to deaths on the waiting lists. That is a complete and total rhetorical flourish added by U.S. reporters and is not in any way the truth, and arguing that the Canadian system is causing unnecessary death is pure demagoguery. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mVh75ylAUXY 

You're not actualy bothering to refute anything Moonie says, are you? It's not like he listens; he's just the flipside of the Swimfan-Random-Post-Generator. 

that is so 2005 

not that ever interrupted anything you had going on 

Hospital sends parents $29,000 bill after son is murdered

There is hope, maybe the parent's insurance will rule it a non-pre-existing condition. 

The Cost of Healthcare Insurance Corporation Profits 

It passed the House. Can it pass the Senate? I say it might. 

It might can!
It might can!

So when's this all supposed to happen?
I don't want to be caught off guard like on my birthday or most Mondays. 

Senate wont get to it for a couple weeks. I think some portions of the plan will be implemented in 2010, regulations and what not. And I think the actual public option portion is slated for 2011 or 2012. 

More than two years from now?
God, this health care thing is worse than Lost. 

SwimFan said:

Hospital sends parents $29,000 bill after son is murdered

There is hope, maybe the parent's insurance will rule it a non-pre-existing condition.

i'm not sure i understand the point of this story or why it's news.
the hospital performed services and then billed the client for those services.
that = evil? 

oh! that it didn't get flagged right, so they got the regular bill instead of a nice letter before the bill? 

"Here at His Infinite Mercy Hospital,
WE don't charge you a DIME until YOU'RE all BETTER!
1-800-DONT-DIE" 

Well their services kinda failed in that regard.

I don't really care what their legal right was,
sending the parents a bill of that magnitude for 5 minutes care that failed tremendously
is morally repugnant. 

Well their services kinda failed in that regard.

Because why? They were administered improperly? The diagnosis was wrong? Was it the course of treatment? 

I mean I understand that the hospital probably can't afford to be paid according to the effectiveness of their services,
but that's an absurd amount of money and a distasteful way to request it. 

you don't know much about things, do you sbw? 

Would a box of chocolates with a handwritten bill at the bottom of the box have smoothed things over for the parents who just lost their son to violent death? 

Because why? They were administered improperly? The diagnosis was wrong? Was it the course of treatment?

Their level 5 trauma care failed to save the kid.
They didn't kill him, no, but I feel like there's something wrong with this situation. 

dude. family members dying sucks balls.
and one of the really shitty things about it is that the moment that you find out...the world keeps spinning.
and the next day, the first morning you wake up without that loved one, you've still got to get out of bed. You've got phone calls to make and arrangements, and you've got insurance shit to start figuring out, and sometimes you've got bills to pay. 

Their level 5 trauma care failed to save the kid.
They didn't kill him, no, but I feel like there's something wrong with this situation.

Yes:
His roommate beat him to death, you dummy. 

so the issue (would/would not?)* be a news story if the kid had been hit a few less times or a little less hard, gone to the same hospital, received the same treatment, lived, and then been billed the same amount.

*please circle one 

you don't know much about things, do you sbw?

I don't really know much about hospital administration and finances no,
but if such knowledge means that I find situations like this somehow acceptable
I don't really care to.

It's probably a pretty fucked up thing to receive this bill, essentially for the efforts to save your son,
when they failed in that regard.
It doesn't really matter to me that this might be some standard operating procedure in a fucked up system. 

but if such knowledge means that I find situations like this somehow acceptable
I don't really care to.

No one is asking you to find a murder acceptable.
Thinking that somehow the hospital did something wrong because one person murdered another is really something you should be able to figure your way out of without the technical knowledge.

It doesn't really matter to me that this might be some standard operating procedure in a fucked up system.

Stop being so lame.
It was a clerical error.
Clerical errors are generally a bad indicator of how the system is doing overall. 

The issue would not have made the news if 5 fucking minutes of care didn't cost someone $29,000,
not to mention their son's life.

His roommate beat him to death, you dummy.

Right,
and that this should cost an extra $29000 should strike some sort of discord in you,
even if you're okay with the legal situation that allowed this. 

Stop being so lame.
It was a clerical error.
Clerical errors are generally a bad indicator of how the system is doing overall.

Not the clerical error,
the failed $29000 worth of medical care. 

and that this should cost an extra $29000 should strike some sort of discord in you,

I think it sucks for the family. How that translates into "Oh, god, the hospital is so horrible because they tried to save the boy from dying", I haven't a clue. 

Okay, so you have a vague feeling of strong discontent.
What exactly do you think was done wrong, and by whom?
You haven't actually pinned that down. 

I think it sucks for the family. How that translates into "Oh, god, the hospital is so horrible because they tried to save the boy from dying", I haven't a clue.

It isn't as if the hospital is doing something out of the norm for hospitals
or that this is some unique case,
it is that this happens at all and that you're okay with it. 

this should cost an extra $29000 should strike some sort of discord in you

I don't really know much about hospital administration and finances no,
but if such knowledge means that I find situations like this somehow acceptable
I don't really care to.

They didn't kill him, no, but I feel like there's something wrong with this situation.

sending the parents a bill of that magnitude for 5 minutes care that failed tremendously
is morally repugnant.

I'll ask again:
What are you identifying as the problem? 

Okay, so you have a vague feeling of strong discontent.
What exactly do you think was done wrong, and by whom?
You haven't actually pinned that down.

Any number of factors that contributed to the ridiculous charges for a service performed
that, after performed, didn't produce any different a result had they not been performed,
and that this is found to be acceptable to any individual. 

It's probably a pretty fucked up thing to receive this bill, essentially for the efforts to save your son, when they failed in that regard.

Why is the failure at all relevant to the charge? Health care charges for emergency care are pretty much never contingent on the success of the physician, for two reasons:

1) They can't not-care for people who aren't going to make it, so they have to treat everyone who comes through the doors
2) They can't save everyone. Some people are too far gone.

You can't have a hospital if they can't get compensation for failing to save someone who might not make it. 

Any number of factors that contributed to the ridiculous charges for a service performed
that, after performed, didn't produce any different a result had they not been performed,
and that this is found to be acceptable to any individual.

So every time a hospital tries to help someone and it doesn't work,
They should just eat the cost, no matter how hopeless the ailment is.

That is really, really dumb. 

slutbinwalla said:

Any number of factors that contributed to the ridiculous charges for a service performed
that, after performed, didn't produce any different a result had they not been performed,
and that this is found to be acceptable to any individual.

So, you think the doctors should have triaged him, deemed him beyond saving and avoiding incurring any costs by letting him die on the floor, perhaps with some newspaper under him to avoid staining the linoleum? 

You can't have a hospital if they can't get compensation for failing to save someone who might not make it.

Right, I get how this wouldn't work in modern medical finances.
That doesn't mean that I can't think it fucked up,
especially considering the $6000 a minute price tag. 

The hospital visit should have been free because the doctor was unable (or unwilling!) to figure out how to cure bludgeoning. 

slutbinwalla said:

Right, I get how this wouldn't work in modern medical finances.
That doesn't mean that I can't think it fucked up,
especially considering the $6000 a minute price tag.

Emergency intensive care in a time-critical situation that comes up suddenly is expensive. Who knew? 

So every time a hospital tries to help someone and it doesn't work,
They should just eat the cost, no matter how hopeless the ailment is.

That is really, really dumb.

In a system in which these life saving procedures have to be cost effective above all else,
it might seem really really dumb.
I don't think I'm completely out of the line thinking that such a system is really really dumb,
am I? 

That doesn't mean that I can't think it fucked up

It is. The problem is that you seem to be blaming the hospital, when
- The roommate, not the hospital, beat the kid to death.
- The college, not the hospital, told the parents that he was found dead (rather than taken to the hospital)
- It was a clerical error that flagged the case improperly.

This is what made it all such an awful shock for the family,
And yet you seem to be trying to indict the system as if this is all a matter of policy. 

I think we can agree there might be some negotiating in terms of the actual cost; $29,000 does seem a little high, but I think that's a matter endemic to the system. It's not a one-time-screw-these-particular-parents kind of thing. Health care costs are out of control and complaining about point cases is like putting fingers in a leaking dam.

That said, though, the principle of the charge itself is pretty solid. 

The hospital visit should have been free because the doctor was unable (or unwilling!) to figure out how to cure bludgeoning.

The hospital visit should have been free because it seems absurd to regularly present people with the choice of life and subsequent financial ruin
or death (and possible financial ruin). 

rabbiwanna said:

The hospital visit should have been free because the doctor was unable (or unwilling!) to figure out how to cure bludgeoning.

i lol'd,
then the shame set in. 

I don't mean to blame the hospital alone,
and my apologies it came out that way.
Rather consider the hospital too a victim of sorts for having to perpetrate this disgusting situation
and place the blame wherever it should otherwise fall. 

slutbinwalla said:

The hospital visit should have been free because it seems absurd to regularly present people with the choice of life and subsequent financial ruin
or death (and possible financial ruin).

This is what health insurance is for.

Also, doctors can't and don't check financial records before administering care and it would be retarded if a doctor first had to play financial advisor and claims adjuster before even thinking of trying to save the patient's life.

That's no way to get good health care out of a hospital. 

And, consequently, why it's a really awesome idea to have everyone covered under some form of health insurance. 

That said, though, the principle of the charge itself is pretty solid.

I don't know if it is "solid" per se,
but I'll admit it justified by the fucked up health care financial system that exists. 

And, consequently, why it's a really awesome idea to have everyone covered under some form of health insurance.

Essentially. 

but I'll admit it justified by the fucked up health care financial system that exists.

Why don't you go ahead and spell out what the justification is, as you see it.