Mayo Clinic dropping Medicare patients
posted at 2:20 pm on January 4, 2010 by Ed Morrissey
Barack Obama hailed the Mayo Clinic system as a model for health-care reform last summer — until Mayo opposed ObamaCare as a reform solution. They warned at the time that the bill passing through Congress would make Medicare and Medicaid reimbursements too low to pay for the costs of service and that providers would stop treating patients in those systems. Last week, that became a self-fulfilling prophecy of sorts:
The Mayo Clinic, praised by President Barack Obama as a national model for efficient health care, will stop accepting Medicare patients as of tomorrow at one of its primary-care clinics in Arizona, saying the U.S. government pays too little.
More than 3,000 patients eligible for Medicare, the government’s largest health-insurance program, will be forced to pay cash if they want to continue seeing their doctors at a Mayo family clinic in Glendale, northwest of Phoenix, said Michael Yardley, a Mayo spokesman. The decision, which Yardley called a two-year pilot project, won’t affect other Mayo facilities in Arizona, Florida and Minnesota.
Obama in June cited the nonprofit Rochester, Minnesota-based Mayo Clinic and the Cleveland Clinic in Ohio for offering “the highest quality care at costs well below the national norm.” Mayo’s move to drop Medicare patients may be copied by family doctors, some of whom have stopped accepting new patients from the program, said Lori Heim, president of the American Academy of Family Physicians, in a telephone interview yesterday.
“Many physicians have said, ‘I simply cannot afford to keep taking care of Medicare patients,’” said Heim, a family doctor who practices in Laurinburg, North Carolina. “If you truly know your business costs and you are losing money, it doesn’t make sense to do more of it.”
How bad has it gotten for Mayo? The clinics in question lost $120 million on treating Medicare patients. The Mayo system overall lost close to a billion dollars the year before, dropping $840 million on patients from government-funded treatment plans.
Overall, Bloomberg reports that providers receive 20% less from Medicare than from private insurers. Part of that disparity comes from charging higher rates to patients whose insurance will cover services in order to cover their losses — and to patients who pay cash. The dirty little secret in the health-care industry is that these insurance companies subsidize Medicare through these cost transfers, which allow providers to remain in business but which amount to a hidden tax on everyone who buys private insurance.
One cannot expand Medicare while cutting payments to providers and expect that services will not be degraded and benefits curtailed. Providers will start opting out of the system altogether, as Mayo will do in Arizona and as they are contemplating doing altogether. A decreasing availability of providers for Medicare and Medicaid will mean fewer resources, longer waiting times, and poorer health care for people covered by those plans.
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get used to it….this buffon Obama is going to kill the world’s best health care and replace it with the most ineffective, unmotivated DMV care ever……
Oh except that HE and HIS FAMILY along with CONGRESS will NOT HAVE TO EAT THIS CRAP SANDWICH THEY FORCED ON US!!!
SDarchitect on January 4, 2010 at 2:24 PM
ObamaCare will cut doctors fees by another 21%.
Chuck Schick on January 4, 2010 at 2:24 PM
DEATH PANELS
portlandon on January 4, 2010 at 2:24 PM
Good. My dad, who is a physician in FL, is contemplating the same.
ballz2wallz on January 4, 2010 at 2:25 PM
For once he was right, they are a model.
WashJeff on January 4, 2010 at 2:25 PM
Barack Obama hailed the Mayo Clinic system as a model for health-care reform last summer
Is it here in Canada!(Sarc).
canopfor on January 4, 2010 at 2:25 PM
Just a starter house. The finish work and additional rooms come later.
a capella on January 4, 2010 at 2:25 PM
No wonder Obama thinks that they’re the national model for efficient health care. They’re subsidizing Medicare and Obama hasn’t even taken over them yet.
orlandocajun on January 4, 2010 at 2:26 PM
Liberalism always achieves the opposite of its stated intent.
singlemalt_18 on January 4, 2010 at 2:26 PM
The natural progression here is that very swiftly it will become illegal to refuse medical patients who are on Medicare/Medicaid. It will be interesting in the abstract to see what penalties are proposed…
Mr Michael on January 4, 2010 at 2:27 PM
My wife is a VP for a local health system. She has said that one of their contigency plans is to do the same thing. Plus, I believe once you drop Medicare (relatively good payers) you can drop Medicaid (horrible pay). You can argue all you want about the morality of such a move…but strictly as a business decision, I foresee this being the first domino to drop.
search4truth on January 4, 2010 at 2:27 PM
glendale, my neck of the woods…have neighbors who got letters regarding this…they aren’t too happy, few are going to stay on and most are looking elsewhere…
cmsinaz on January 4, 2010 at 2:27 PM
Cool, that should help solve our medical professional oversupply problem.
Thune on January 4, 2010 at 2:28 PM
Reality.
ted c on January 4, 2010 at 2:28 PM
One problem, however, is that payouts from private insurance are also likely to drop.
Perhaps they’ll be a boutique operation for cash customers?
AnninCA on January 4, 2010 at 2:28 PM
Hmmm why do I suspect a sudden IRS interest in The Mayo Clinic and every one of its directors?
angryed on January 4, 2010 at 2:29 PM
The penalty will eventually come to patients due to competent physician shortage.
a capella on January 4, 2010 at 2:29 PM
And if Obama follows Chavez’ playbook, expect these clinics to be nationalized to “protect the people” in 2011…
Skywise on January 4, 2010 at 2:29 PM
+1
John the Libertarian on January 4, 2010 at 2:31 PM
Medicare makes treatment more expensive for everyone who isn’t on Medicare. That’s the joke, isn’t it?
lorien1973 on January 4, 2010 at 2:31 PM
Our favorite doctor does not accept insurance, s-chip, medicare or medicaid payments, just cash, checks or credit cards. An office visit is $50 and he will do his darnedest to provide you with at least a month’s worth of samples if a prescription is needed.
2nd Ammendment Mother on January 4, 2010 at 2:32 PM
Until that’s made illegal. In Canada up until a supreme court ruling that said otherwise, it was illegal to run a private health clinic. And that was the case for about 30 years. And even now, private clinics are allowed in a very limited scope.
It’s useful idiots such as yourself that refuse to understand just what ObamaCare means….the complete takeover of health care by the govt. May not happen tomorrow or next year or next decade. But at some point all these rules and regulations will simply suffocate the life out of private health care.
But there won’t be any pre-existing conditions so you’ll be happy I suppose….
angryed on January 4, 2010 at 2:32 PM
Pookie says his long time family DR is retiring if this crapola sammich passes into law…….until then, cash only – sigh
Ris4victory on January 4, 2010 at 2:33 PM
That’s fair. Processing insurance is costly. I have read about some doctors moving this direction. People love it, too. Frankly, the insurance co-pays have gotten steadily higher and higher to the point where it’s probably cost-effective for patients, too.
One doctor charges $25 to file paperwork for insurance. Amazing.
AnninCA on January 4, 2010 at 2:35 PM
I would expect them to drop. Since private ensurers have been subsidizing medicare/medicaid coverage for years. Dropping those patients would allow private insurers to pay less and still cover the actual cost of coverage.
MarkTheGreat on January 4, 2010 at 2:35 PM
He’ll be in good company since I think about 15-20% of docs in Florida have already done the same. By the way, the article is about the Mayo branch in AZ. The main clinic in MN (as far as I know) dropped Medicare a few years ago.
The way I see it, the feds will eventually have to mandate that all doctors accept Medicare, and/or just open the floodgates and start letting a lot of foreign trained doctors into the US or there’s going to be a very serious doctor shortage.
eyedoc on January 4, 2010 at 2:36 PM
That seems logical. However, when have you ever seen it really work out that way in life?
AnninCA on January 4, 2010 at 2:36 PM
The problem is that liberalisms stated intent is rarely it’s real intent.
MarkTheGreat on January 4, 2010 at 2:36 PM
Government-controlled destruction of the finest Healthcare System the world has ever known is in progress right before our very eyes. There will be a lot of people, not the least of which are Health Insurance Agents, out of a job very soon. Believe it.
kingsjester on January 4, 2010 at 2:37 PM
Every single day. That’s how the free market works.
MarkTheGreat on January 4, 2010 at 2:38 PM
“Mayo Clinic dropping Medicare patients; projects cash surplus for research, new equipment, employee benefits”
BobMbx on January 4, 2010 at 2:38 PM
Then they just do the same thing by making sure their patient list is too full for new customers. That’s one of the issues with private PPO insurance. They really don’t have the doctors that are listed, since all of those doctors are “too full” for their PPO patients, which pay less than the cadillac plans.
AnninCA on January 4, 2010 at 2:38 PM
The chances of this being covered by the alphabet news…
about zero.
stenwin77 on January 4, 2010 at 2:39 PM
Again, look to Canada for where this is going. Walk into a hospital in a Canadian city and the likelihood of meeting a Canadian trained doctor is about the same as Nancy Pelosi inviting Dick Cheney to brunch this Sunday.
angryed on January 4, 2010 at 2:40 PM
That’s because they are just useful idiots.
pedestrian on January 4, 2010 at 2:40 PM
Let us know, then. So far, I’ve not seen healthcare costs do ANYTHING but increase at alarming rates.
I wouldn’t hold my breath waiting on a price dip.
AnninCA on January 4, 2010 at 2:41 PM
Bingo. Create a crisis and then move in with your goals.
rbj on January 4, 2010 at 2:41 PM
As Mark Steyn is fond of saying: Socialism brings an equality of misery.
gwelf on January 4, 2010 at 2:41 PM
So it begins….
faol on January 4, 2010 at 2:42 PM
The bald truth is that this is according to plan.
The plan has long been to replace Seniors with legalized illegal aliens…who have many more years to vote Democratic because of the handouts they will get at taxpayer expense.
Moreover, seniors have now turned agains the party of death. As far as the Dems are concerned…the faster they die off the better.
notagool on January 4, 2010 at 2:43 PM
The great unintended consequences of liberalism. If you strat messing in healthcare the way they’ve done, the providers and the payers are going to quit covering for medicaid/care which they have been doing for years and years and years.
Actually this reminds me in a way of the housing market. We really have no idea what the real price of anything is.
ORconservative on January 4, 2010 at 2:43 PM
I thought that sounded familiar for a reason. Frankly, I think there’s a cause & effect thing happening here.
LFRGary on January 4, 2010 at 2:48 PM
And you know why that is, right?
Because government keeps writing laws that mandate that the hospitals must cover more and more situations and people that cannot pay.
Skywise on January 4, 2010 at 2:48 PM
The domino affect will begin to dismantle health care as we know it unless the bill is DOA.
rjoco1 on January 4, 2010 at 2:50 PM
We don’t currently have a free market system.
gwelf on January 4, 2010 at 2:51 PM
Crap sandwich–hold the Mayo.
Steve Z on January 4, 2010 at 2:52 PM
I’m sure Obama will soon respond by introducing legislation to ban doctors from dropping Medicare and Medicaid.
Then these companies, yes liberals they’re companies and not charities for the government, will just go out of business.
And there will be a severe shortage of health services. Rationing, if you will. Just as predicted.
amerpundit on January 4, 2010 at 2:53 PM
I remember in the 80s and 90s how doctors lived in fear of being “disqualified” from participating in the Medicare program if we didn’t tow the line and capitulate to every new encroachment on our practices.
My, how the tables have turned. Soon, the bureaucrats will be scrambling to get primary care doctors to take Medicare reimbursement. Of course, when there is a shortage of participating physicians and patients begin to complain all the blame will be put on the doctors. We will be accused of violating our oath if we refuse to take Medicare and Medicaid, a patently absurd and ignorant allegation.
Here’s another family doc that intends to retire rather than practice government-dictated medicine.
drewas on January 4, 2010 at 2:54 PM
I read elsewhere that many New York doctors are planning on having patients pay up front, and then the patients can deal with Medicare on their own to get their money back.
Is this what they mean by giving more access to more care to more people? Because to me, it looks like the opposite.
hawksruleva on January 4, 2010 at 2:55 PM
Healthcare costs have risen along with state and federal government’s share of the healthcare system.
Just wait’ll you see costs go up after ObamaCare passes.
Chuck Schick on January 4, 2010 at 2:57 PM
“If you like your doctor…”
Abby Adams on January 4, 2010 at 2:57 PM
Sorry, you can’t retire. We have a RIGHT to health care! Who knows, you may be forced to perform procedures without pay. Though I guess that’s sort of what the medicare system is currently moving toward.
I wonder when Congress will put in a plan to “encourage” more people to become doctors? After all, your refusal to become or remain a doctor is infringing upon my right to health care! They’ll need to outlaw the heinous practice that older doctors use to withold services too. No more selfish dying for you! Doctors will be kept alive so they can provide medical consultations.
hawksruleva on January 4, 2010 at 2:59 PM
When we go to the oral surgeon to have wisdom teeth out or whatever we have to pay up front and then attempt to get reimbursed. There is no reason why physicians couldn’t go the same route, but again the politicians have no idea what they are doing and their gullible constituents believe it will be paradise when the overhaul healthcare.
Wait until the gullible need 120 up front for that well baby check.
ORconservative on January 4, 2010 at 3:00 PM
ObamaCare – Post Office Efficiency, IRS Compassion, DMV Wait Times
Dandapani on January 4, 2010 at 3:01 PM
Then you better be extra nice to him……bring him cookies, whiskey, whatever.
In the future, maybe he’ll let you stop by for a “visit” at his house for a handsome fee while he’s “working in his garden”.
Jerome Horwitz on January 4, 2010 at 3:03 PM
Of course, if a member of Congress or the Presidents family needs care at the Mayo Clinic they will be seen and treated under THEIR PLAN.
rjoco1 on January 4, 2010 at 3:03 PM
Keep it up Obama and before long your healthcare system will be second only to Cuba. Well enlightened voters . . . you really screwed us this time. As for the politicians; there simply are no words that could adequately define these brain dead morons.
rplat on January 4, 2010 at 3:05 PM
When I first heard this I misunderstood and thought it was Medicaid they were cutting. Medicare is a smarter choice, seniors know how to raise he!! and won’t hesitate. We have had some serious hospital bills lately and I have never been so grateful for insurance in my life. Not that we haven’t been paying a pretty penny for over thirty years of premiums.
Cindy Munford on January 4, 2010 at 3:05 PM
Again, please do not conflate the cost of health care with the cost of health insurance. If we just talk about the cost of providing health care, medicare pays poorly so providers charge private payers more. If the provider stops taking medicare patients, it can afford to charge the private payers less. As far as “who does this”, apparently it’s people like the above-described doc going to a cash model with a $50 office fee. I guarantee you I haven’t had a doc charge less than $175 (before discount) for a 15-minute visit in the past five years. So “costs” (depending how you look at them) are going down.
If you want your insurance rates to go down, then get a policy that covers less. If the policy is properly priced, it will make no difference to actual out-of-pocket healthcare costs averaged over time. At any rate, the policy has no bearing on the actual cost of healthcare, other than to artificially inflate prices so as to justify the “discount.”
alwaysfiredup on January 4, 2010 at 3:07 PM
Sounds like an Obamateurism candidate.
n0doz on January 4, 2010 at 3:08 PM
The “cost” is how much the Doctor had to pay out of his pocket to treat you.
The “price” is how much the Doctor wants you to compensate him for his services. In the medical world, the Insurance Company (Medicare, Optima, etc.) sets the “price” regardless of the Doctor’s “cost.”
So in short, if it “costs” the Dr. $100 to see a patient for 30 mins, and the Insurer will only compensate the Doctor with $75, then the Doctor will stop accepting new patients and drop current patients with that Insurer. Why would a Doctor keep seeing a patient if he will have to take a $25 loss? In the meantime, the rest of us are subsidizing that $25 loss.
uknowmorethanme on January 4, 2010 at 3:10 PM
.
Ummm that’s because Medicine keeps getting better and better with new treatments drugs and procedures.
Now if YOU want to go back to the 1850′s style medicine that is nice and cheap, I am a licensed phrenologist and I think you may need some laudanum for your hysteria and vapors.
Oh and that is just 10 dollars or 4 chickens.
LincolntheHun on January 4, 2010 at 3:10 PM
When libs start losing relatives to this travesty of Obamacare, they’ll push for Federal mandates on doctors. They’ll never see the problem they created is the real destruction of the adequate care we receive here in the US, not doctors who do amputations for fun and profit as they like to think. In time, I can’t imagine anyone wanting to go into medicine unless he or she is very humanitarian. The veternary schools, though, might have more applicants than they can admit.
Liam on January 4, 2010 at 3:12 PM
Arizona has alot of retirees, right? Probably have alot more medicare claims there than other states per capita
jp on January 4, 2010 at 3:18 PM
I would presume the Mayo Clinic is well run, so your idea would have merit. However, my friend who does small business books tells me that doctors are the worst. They don’t pay attention to business and muddle things up a lot as a result.
Perhaps in this new economy, that will also have to change.
AnninCA on January 4, 2010 at 3:22 PM
I don’t blame Mayo at all. Our healthcare system is headed for a very bad patch if Obamacare makes it to implementation, with more ill-conceived policies and practices in the bill than any of us fully realize yet.
Just wait, too- soon they’ll be encouraging us to use the “Norway model” to treat MRSA:
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/12/23/tech/main6014559.shtml
No antibiotics for you!!
cs89 on January 4, 2010 at 3:24 PM
This morning I had a generally unpleasant medical procedure performed by an excellent medical team. The anesthesiologist, before putting me under, told me that he is going to quit if Obamacare passes. The rest of the team was unsettled because of the prospect of Obamacare. It is a great medical facility, now at risk.
Disgusting.
GaltBlvnAtty on January 4, 2010 at 3:26 PM
Most docs that I know are part of larger corporations. At least in the two areas i’ve lived there are very few small business docs. I’m sure that likely isn’t true in rural areas but there is not too much room for doctors to “muddle” things up anymore.
I do not think you know what you are talking about.
ORconservative on January 4, 2010 at 3:27 PM
We have quite a few small clinics where I lived. I just moved, so I’m not sure about here.
My information comes from their accountant, who made a good living off of straightening out problems of small businesses. If she’s reporting correctly, and I trust she is, she said that doctors were some of the worst. They just tend not to take care of the business end of matters.
AnninCA on January 4, 2010 at 3:30 PM
.
So you are taking second hand unverified information as a valid case study and then leveraging that into a statistical sample that emulates the majority?
.
Yet another example of why Liberals should not be allowed to play scientist.
LincolntheHun on January 4, 2010 at 3:31 PM
Hey, there is still plenty of time to write, call, or email your Congressional Rep and U.S. Senator and point them first in the general direction of Arizona as an example as to where healthcare in this country is headed, then point them in the general direction of your nearest polling place, where you will be heading in November to vote their collective rear ends out of office if they continue to endorse and support B.O. and his insane plan here.
pilamaye on January 4, 2010 at 3:32 PM
Bottom line, at the end of the day, and other assorted clichés:
Don’t Get Sick.
davidk on January 4, 2010 at 3:34 PM
Providers charge cash customers even more than they charge private insurers. The uninsured subsidies both third payers.
burt on January 4, 2010 at 3:37 PM
Not to worry: the pill bill provides billions of dollars to train AA affirmative action doctors to take up the slack. The bill is really rather racist in that it does not provide billions of dollars to train white or Asian doctors.
These new AA affirmative action doctors will treat all medicare, medicaid patients.
What could possibly go wrong?
Dhuka on January 4, 2010 at 3:37 PM
They need us family doctors to make the system work.
Screw the feds – they can’t make us work!
I haven’t taken Medicare in 20 years and I never accepted Medicaid.
Many doctors will just retire rather than put up with their BS.
txdoc on January 4, 2010 at 3:38 PM
Mandated health care will require mandated health.
The only people will qualify in the future for medical care are those who not sick.
Anyone who does get sick or ill will be triaged out–via, dare I say it, death panels.
Dhuka on January 4, 2010 at 3:39 PM
The last doctor friend of mine that went from small business to a larger health corp. did it approximately 5 years ago in a rural town in Michigan. The change was dramaitic and the health system completely changed how they did business complete with office staffing to make sure that their procedures were followed to the letter.
If docs have a name other than their own or in addition to they are no small business. Unless maybe you are talking plastic surgeons or chiropracters or podiatrists, medical doctors have, for the most part, aligned themselves with big companies. If you’re talking other specialties, they won’t have much business anyway.
ORconservative on January 4, 2010 at 3:39 PM
Anyone here remember the family doctor?
This was a person, now extinct, that you went to for nearly any ailment short of a car crash.
You used to be able to pay them for their services at a little window in the lobby.
Need them to treat you at a hospital? You could set up a payment plan.
Insurance-free, giant-corporation-free and most of all government-free health care will be making a comeback.
American ingenuity at work.
Dorvillian on January 4, 2010 at 3:39 PM
This is very true, I was looking for a family doctor and they can gave me a list of doctors in BC in the town I live in, that were accepting new patients. The three doctors names were all foreign so I picked one and went to see her. She was from India and I found it hard to understand her English and I couldn’t keep my eyes off of her yellow teeth. Nevertheless I did not return, I think I will just stick to the clinics.
royzer on January 4, 2010 at 3:41 PM
That’s not really the point though. The point is that the government is not going to give doctors a choice of whether you’ll accept their economically unjustifiable fees. You will just be forced to participate in the plan, the way certain states are now mandating that doctors participate in Medicaid whether they want to or not.
eyedoc on January 4, 2010 at 3:51 PM
This is the way it should be, for all medical care and all payers. Pay for your care yourself, and then it is your responsibility to get reimbursed from whatever insurance you have. If you are lazy or forgetful, and don’t really need the money, the doctor still gets paid. If Medicare bureaucrats are lazy or the system gets bollixed up by too many claims being filed, the doctor does not get paid. I’ll bet most people don’t know that even today, doctors cannot file or receive Medicare claims electronically. It is still done by fax and even snail mail, with Medicare cutting checks. This is also the source of a lot of costly fraud in Medicare, which costs us billions every year. If each patient had to file his/her own claim with Medicare, and could do so electronically, there would be virtually no more fraud.
We never should have turned doctors into paper-pushing bureaucrats or forced them to hire multiple staff-people just to file paperwork. It costs me nothing to file my own paperwork once or twice a year, but if my doctor has to do it for 1000 patients it costs him plenty, and those costs get factored into higher prices for his services.
In addition, if people actually got the bill for their entire care and not just for the co-pays, they would start to exert some market pressure on prices. Most people don’t want to carry hundreds of dollars in costs while waiting for reimbursement, so they will start avoiding unnecessary tests and procedures and start questioning the prices of thise they do get.
I’ve always had dental insurance, but I have never had a dentist who filed the insurance claim for me. I always have to pay up front and then get reimbursed. It’s never bothered me a bit.
rockmom on January 4, 2010 at 3:55 PM
Unfortunately, that’s actually against federal law, and it’s not gonna fly.
eyedoc on January 4, 2010 at 3:56 PM
You are an unpatriotic enemy of justice and equality. Be prepared for your re-education in the near future.
The government drafted doctors and medical students during World War II and forced them to train for the specialties it needed on the battlefield (my father became an anesthesiologist even though he wanted to be an internist.) I have no doubt that if this abomination becomes law and survives a constitutional challenge, there will be nothing stopping Congress from passing a “draft law” that will require all trained physicians under the age of 65 to continue to practice and to take all patients under Medicare, Medicaid, and ObamaCare. You won’t be able to quit or retire.
rockmom on January 4, 2010 at 4:01 PM
Where is Bleeds Blue and the other “progressives” to tell us how wonderful this all is?
darwin on January 4, 2010 at 4:06 PM
Sure, some physicians are not talented business people, but most are, or hire someone to oversee the business end. I have several physicians in my family. My aunt knows to the hour how many hours a month she works before she starts to have any personal income, and it’s shocking. Sometime during the last 3 days of each month she begins to earn something herself.
I do have OK insurance. Yet it is in many ways a pain, rules about where I can go, what medicines and procedures are covered, bugging me to take certain tests and use their in-house prescription service. I don’t mind the idea of paying for regular visits, not at all. It’s the catastrophic stuff that scares all of us. Catastrophic insurance would suit me.
Bottom line: Medical care is something we all have to have, and the left wants to control it. After everything physicians go through to qualify, they have to answer to too many agencies and entities already. It is no longer an attractive career choice.
jodetoad on January 4, 2010 at 4:23 PM
That should be the Sub-head to every post on this story… I love it.
Mr Michael on January 4, 2010 at 4:24 PM
And HELLO!!!!! all you idiot military retirees who voted for the handsome black guy. Guess what your TRICARE retiree medical plan is tied to????
Since you were stupid enough to vote for him, I’ll have to explain it. TriCare reimbursement rates are tied to…c’mon, c’mon…THAT’S it! MEDICARE rates. Very good.
And if doctors are dropping Medicare patients because the rates are too low to make it worth seeing you, guess what could very well happen to you, Mr., say, 50-something retired MGSgt. Not “the doctor is out”, but “you’re OUT a doctor”.
Already happened here in Pensacola with the cuts this summer and this round is gonna be worse.
My eyes blur over with red every time I see one of those frickin’ cult stickers at the commissary. I just want to Sharpie “Thanks, a$$hole” over it.
tree hugging sister on January 4, 2010 at 4:30 PM
Are you under the impression that the free market has anything to do with health care? If so, are you normally this delusional?
MarkTheGreat on January 4, 2010 at 4:31 PM
I love how Lawyers are making all the rules for everybody else, while they charge 200 to 300 and higher for such simple services as divorce. When will the gov step in an say they are making too much? They wont. ever. We need to quit voting in “greedy” lawyers because they are simply manipulating the sytsem to fit thier own agendas.
CriticalUpdate on January 4, 2010 at 4:33 PM
Critical at 4:33
You are right, especially with respect to the democratic party’s reliable plaintiffs’ lawyers, who make out like bandits under Obamacare.
GaltBlvnAtty on January 4, 2010 at 4:37 PM
Put this question to an Obamacare supporter and see how they answer — given the importance of ensuring equal access to justice in America, isn’t there a stronger case for capping the hourly rates for all attorneys in the U.S.? Would setting a max of $100 per hour for compensation for all professions requiring a law license increase or decrease the amount of legal services people get?
It’s a good test of whether people understand supply and demand.
DrSteve on January 4, 2010 at 4:37 PM
Hmmm… as one of those retirees.. and knowing quite a few… I don’t know of ANY of them who voted for Obama.
Romeo13 on January 4, 2010 at 4:40 PM
I hope you are talking dollars per hour, not total there.
MarkTheGreat on January 4, 2010 at 4:40 PM
“. . . you can keep your doctor — but you may have to pay him or her in cash. Hey, I never said it wasn’t going to cost you a whole lot more, did I? Wait . . . I did? Well, you’re an idiot for believing anything I said, aren’t you? I’ve shown you over and over and over again that I’m a pathological liar, and that I’ll promise you anything to get what I want. Suckers!”
Love, Barry
AZCoyote on January 4, 2010 at 4:57 PM
Tri-Care (the system for the military when on-base is not available and retirees) will be next since its reimbursement rates are similar to medicare. Take that Vets!
Dingbat63 on January 4, 2010 at 5:01 PM
My doc says that the VA doctors have degrees but are not necessarily licensed. That’s likely going to metastasize to the general medical community. So we’ll have plenty of “doctors” with degrees from remote countries and no licensing.
My doctor used to refuse medicare patients until many of her patients grew old enough to be on it. She says the healthcare “reforms” were drawn up by lawyers, who caused the high costs in the first place, and that to make a profit, she’ll only be able to spend SIX MINUTES per patient.
She thinks a black market for medical care will emerge because, after all, when we’re ALL considered criminals for one reason or another, what do we have to lose by breaking the law?
NTWR on January 4, 2010 at 5:44 PM
Wish I could say the same. The NAS NEX parking lot doesn’t have as many O-festooned bumpers as it once did (go figure), but there’s still plenty to be found.
tree hugging sister on January 4, 2010 at 5:58 PM
Our Tricare rates are actually tied to Medicare’s. Whence goes that, there goes us. (See my comment above at 4:30.)
tree hugging sister on January 4, 2010 at 6:00 PM
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