Instead of dropping the mike on the way out, Obama plans to burn the place down. One of the things this story exposes is the idiocy of passing massive, bloated legislation which is still not particularly specific, and gives Executive Office agencies entirely too much latitude to create rules and regulations
Obama Health Care Regulators Are In A Last-Minute Frenzy To Do More Damage
Here’s a headline that should scare anyone who has been following ObamaCare: “As time runs out, the Obama administration races to reshape health care.†Hasn’t it done enough damage reshaping health care already?
The story appeared Tuesday on STAT, an online news site produced by Boston Globe Media that focuses on health issues.
It reports that with time running short, administration officials are rushing to put in place “major new initiatives that will take full effect just weeks before the president leaves office.â€
Among the efforts: trying to clamp down on drug prices, “revamping how primary care is provided,†and “significant new efforts when it comes to paying for surgeries and preventing disease.â€
And just how do they plan to do all this? As the article explains, ObamaCare created a little-known agency called the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation with the mission of testing “innovative payment and service delivery models to reduce program expenditures.†The law pre-funded the center with $10 billion over a decade, and gave it wide latitude to mandate changes in how Medicare and Medicaid pay providers.
Mentioned in the article is how the center instituted a policy to control costs on hip and knee replacements, with penalties to hospitals if the total cost, including therapy, exceeds a certain threshold, and bonuses for bills below a cap. Can anyone see the problem here? That hospitals might scrimp? I know someone who just got a knee replacement last week. But, due to complications, they had to stay in the hospital an extra day. More medicines were required. Therapy will take longer. Might hospitals try and kick people out too early? The article notes that “An analysis by Avalere Health, for example, found that 60% of hospitals will face penalties this year.” Think they won’t work hard to avoid those penalties? Who pays the penalty?
Ocare is all about controlling the up-front costs, not about quality care. You, the consumer, are the one who pays the ultimate penalty.
President Obama is trying to help Hillary Clinton: if he can get the regs put in place, she won’t face the political firestorm for them being there. If Donald Trump wins, he can just cancel them.
Teach,
Just a little FYI. As soon as you admit a patient to the hospital, a nurse shows up and begins auditing the chart. Morning and afternoon, you get calls from the nurse demanding that the patient be discharged. It does not matter if the patient is in distress or not, the push is always on to get them out of the hospital. Then there is the issue of re-admit. If the patient come back in the hospital for any reason within I believe 6 weeks, then there is all hell to pay. I have seen really sick patients in the ER as doctors and administrators debate the advisability of putting them back in. To sum it up, our health care system is broken and is only getting worse under O care.
Do private insurers ever try to reduce costs?
Oooops!
http://khn.org/morning-breakout/house-republicans-win-suit-over-obamacare-subsidies/
Mr 7134 wrote:
Uhhh, no: nurses do not take decisions concerning admissions or discharges; those decisions are the province of physicians. There may be bureaucrats pushing for discharges, but the nurses don’t.
It is true that the nurses tell the physicians what to do. :)
dana,
I am in the middle of the issue, so I guess I don’t know, right. As to if you are married to a nurse, my experience is that most nurses have no idea what is going on, even on their own ward. Administration does have a nurse audit charts and constantly demands that the patient be given the boot. But don’t listen to people who know.
For some reason, competition causes companies to compete. One way is with lower prices. Another might be better service.. Works every time it is tried.
“Do private insurers ever try to reduce costs?” Of course. And you might add, Do individuals ever try to reduce the cost of their medical care? Of course. The issue is not, Is it good to reduce costs? The issue is, How do you go about it? And, Who decides what is worth the money: the patient, or a government bureaucrat?
If we had a free market medical system, this would never be an issue. The patient would pay for his own medical care. Patients would shop around for the best deal. Providers would have an incentive to cut costs, but they would have to find ways to do so while keeping quality of care reasonably high. This scheme has worked very well in areas that are not heavily regulated by the government. I don’t need the government to tell, say, computer manufacturers to control costs. They do it themselves because they have to if they want to win customers.
Sure, medical care can involve catastrophic costs so people will buy insurance, which complicates the equation. People get into fights with their homeowners insurance company or their car insurance company about exactly what’s covered and what isn’t and how much. But at least with private insurance you have a choice of which insurarance company you choose. You can do research and find who pays claims fairly and who doesn’t. With government regulations, you don’t have a choice. If you think the government is willing to pay too much for too little quality, that’s too bad, you still have to pay for it with your taxes. If you think the government is too tight and isn’t willing to pay for reasonable care, that’s too bad, you and the hospital are still subject to the regulations. If Al would be willing to pay $5,000 for premium care while Bob would be willing to settle for lower quality care for $3,000, that’s too bad, because government regulations are “one size fits all”.