[Magdalen] health care...

[Eleanor Braun]

Note - you will be applying for Medicare, not Medicaid.

I'm on Medicare with a Medigap policy from my last employer - the Federal
Government.  Everything has been easy as pie as I've gone through surgery,
chemotherapy and followup exams.  I haven't had to pay a dime, and don't
have to worry about anything.  I get EOBs (explanation of benefits) from
Blue Cross/Blue Shield, my Medigap coverage, when I have appointments, but
those are just for my information.  Medicare gives me an annual statement
about what was spent.  This is only one step away from single payer, and I
would hope that we can get there sometime.

On cancer treatment, there was a fascinating series on PBS, called "Cancer:
the Emperor of all Maladies
<http://video.pbs.org/program/story-cancer-emperor-all-maladies/>."  It
tracks how scientists have gradually learned more about the disease(s), and
how each step forward was seen as the magic bullet, until they found out
that it wasn't.  Now scientists are moving into immunotherapy, the newest
magic bullet.  What I came away thinking is that great progress has been
made against cancer, there is still a great deal to be learned, and we have
to just keep working toward the assortment of treatments to make it less
fatal and extend the quality of life.

Eleanor



On Tue, Oct 20, 2015 at 1:03 PM, Lynn Ronkainen <houstonklr at gmail.com>
wrote:

> just another turbulent topic in the news... Health Care..
>
> What do you folks think about all the recent (several years now)
> information that decades of cancer treatments have been ineffective in far
> broader ways than the general public was aware, 'discoveries' about the
> need for less mammograms/pap smears, , etc, etc, etc... For me this has
> translated into what my insurance company will allow based on US Government
> *guidelines*... and I am beginning to become a bit cynical about how much
> more the government is going to 'discover'  that will affect insurance
> coverage.
>
> I'm already waiting for my annual exam to see how it is 'billed'. A friend
> told me that her one annual exam this year (a few months ago) was billed as
> two (one covered by insurance, one not covered but shifted to her
> pay-to-reach-deductable category). Her regular exam, considered
> 'preventative' (a big huge tenant of the National Health Program Umbrella),
> turned into a second visit as well when the doctor ordered several
> diagnostic blood tests along with the 'preventative blood work'.  She was
> billed  for a partial payment on her preventative visit and billed the
> whole shebang on the diagnostic 'visit'.... Doctor's office stood by the
> way the insurance company looked at it and she had a $150. doctor  bill for
> the ordering of one blood test.
>
> Makes me wonder if one could just find out from the doctor ahead of time
> that this blood work would be 'needed', take care of it on ones own at a
> local lab and then provide the doctor with the results... AND if that would
> save the additional visit bill for diagnostic, what are we saying about
> continuality of care in this whole mess?  As we muck about dissing
> 'socialized medicine' we're creating something less stable and more
> unwieldy, and still the principles are making $$$ up the wazoo, or maybe
> it's just the insurance companies making any *real* money these days.
>
> Am I becoming paranoid here?  Will the government start deciding who/what
> can get the kind of treatment a doctor would have heretofore have
> recommended?  Were all these 'steps', some of which have had phase-in plans
> from the start, intended to cause profit only?    And don't get me started
> about the Medicaid info I read the other day (which I'm counting the 2
> years + less than a month till I qualify)  which sounded like if I collect
> SS at 66 I might have to pay $350. a month for Medicaid?? (and it didn't
> sound like a supplement would defray *this* part of the cost).
>
> Lynn
>
> website: www.ichthysdesigns.com
>
> When I stand before God at the end of my life I would hope that I have not
> a single bit of talent left and could say, "I used everything You gave me."
> attributed to Erma Bombeck
> "Either Freedom for all or stop talking about Freedom at all" from a talk
> by Richard Rohr
>