Health Care

[cornflakesdisease]

I'm sick of hearing the spin on malpractice making health care so exspensive. I live in Texas where it's capped at 250,000 max damages. (So when they cut off the wrong leg, that's the most you can get for pain and suffering, fair trade right?)

we still have terrible health care, 45% of Texans with no coverage, that no one can afford anyways. But here again, in Texas 50% of the automobile drivers have no auto insurance, so what the hay. But they can charge the highest primiums in the land. So they make money off that, even though accident are about the same frequency in Texas per population unit as they are in New York or anywhere else. I see, it pays to have it this way.

Anyways,

Malpractice insurance is a cost in health care, but it doesn't even make the top 5 reasons why health insurance is so costly. It's a bait and switch topic.

Make the connection.

[MonkeyMama]

Re: Health Care

LOL.

Well I do financial statements and taxes for a myriad of doctors, and most of them their BIGGEST expense is malpractice insurance. & that says a lot for a high COL area. IT is far more than rent even.

I would say the average premiums I see is $100k/year insurance for a doctor who has a good record. A few of our doctors get by with far less - one mostly practices dermatology and she doesn't pay that much. But we have a lot of surgeons and eye doctors who perform LASIK. Their malpractice premiums are HUGE!!!!

Malpractice insurance is the highest cost of healthcare I have seen by far. So I have to disagree.

#2 would be the uninsured. YEs doctors are billing you double or triple for everything because they do not get paid by a big chunk of their patients. This actually probably would be #1 - we can switch these 2.

This is what I See in private practices. You would not believe what doctors bill and how much of that gets written off as uncollectible. a HUGE chunk.

[disneysteve]

Re: Health Care

Malpractice insurance is the highest cost of healthcare I have seen by far. So I have to disagree.

You are both right, but about different things.

Malpractice insurance is generally the largest single expense for doctors, so MonkeyMama is right about that. But malpractice insurance is not paid for by health insurance companies or Medicare or the government, so it isn't really factored in to the overall costs of healthcare, so the OP is right about that. Rather, the premiums come out of the doctors' pockets. So although it is a major reason why physician income has been steadily declining, it is not responsible for the overall increases in healthcare costs. That would only be true if doctors raised their rates in order to help pay for their malpractice insurance. Since doctors have no control over what they charge for their services, it doesn't work that way.

[Fern]

Re: Health Care

Once again, your statistics (both of them) are suspect.

[disneysteve]

Re: Health Care

in Texas 50% of the automobile drivers have no auto insurance, so what the hay. But they can charge the highest primiums in the land.

Numerous states have higher average auto premiums than Texas. Here's one list that compares them, and it doesn't include NJ which is generally listed as the highest.

http://www.insurance.com/Article.aspx/Auto_Insurance_Rates_Decline_in_2005/artid/342

And the uninsured motorist rate is 20%, not 50%.

http://www.tdi.state.tx.us/reports/documents/hb3588rpt.doc

[kv968]

Re: Health Care

Numerous states have higher average auto premiums than Texas. Here's one list that compares them, and it doesn't include NJ which is generally listed as the highest.

It doesn't include NJ because the site states that NJ joined the platform in 2005 when the list was produced.

"The list does not include MA, HI, AK who are not serviced by Insurance.com or New Jersey who joined our platform in 2005."

So unfortunately I'm sure we (NJ) would have been near the top of the list had we been included

[zetta]

Re: Health Care

In my blog I summarized a very interesting book called "Money-Driven Medicine". This book doesn't list malpractice insurance as a primary driver of spiraling costs. A lot more of it is coming from all the players in the industry encouraging overuse of medical procedures on the insured and underuse of preventive medicine for the uninsured. Fraud and administrative waste play their part, but the biggest problem is that health care as an economic market is simply broken -- the usual actions of supply and demand have been corrupted in ways that will be tricky to fix.

[MonkeyMama]

Re: Health Care

Ah, but it amazes me what doctors will do to avoid malpractice lawsuits - I still think it plays a big factor. It makes doctors more expensive. & our litigous society has completely changed the way medicine is practice.

BUT I do appreciate your input Steve and Zetta. I think the healthcare crisis is often over-simplified - as with anything many complicated factors at play. & I truly believe frivolous lawsuits play a big factor, even if it is more indirectly. But there is certainly a whole lot more to rising healthcare costs.

I totally hear you on overuse of medical practices on the insured. I can see in prenatal care and pregnancy/delivery it is very apparent after going through that and talking to communities of women online - the care for the high-cost insurance was way too overkill (& the norm). On the flipside, government insurance (US military or Canada) was often sloppy and hard to find care. There has got to be some middle ground.

[PRICEPLUS]

Re: Health Care

Insurance costs go up every year for the wife and I. I am not sure what the answer is but I don't think it is the government,