If We Told You That, We Would Have to Shoot You
26th April 2012
What product can you buy that is expensive, works with your PC, does things that could be critical to your health, but the salesman can’t tell you how to use it?
Sounds stupid, huh?
A lot of medical products, that’s what.
I found this out during a long and painful experience with Obstructive Sleep Apnea.
April 26th, 2012 at 07:36
I actually have experienced this scenario, and am currently using a CPAP. A while back my dog got hold of the nose-piece (‘pillows’ is the quaint techical term) and chewed it up. So I go to the medical supply house to get a new nose ‘pillow’. No prescription on file. Well, I’ll pay for it, I say; How much? Answer: $35.00.
For a little molded piece of soft plastic that fits in/on your nose. About the size of a garden hose fitting. $35.00.
I actually considered going to Home Depot and getting a few things and making my own. Probably cost me $12.50 tops, plus my time. But I didn’t have the time, and I needed the damned thing, so I paid.
No wonder health care is so expensive. Nobody’s minding the store.
April 26th, 2012 at 11:00
Dennis, your story is a great example of exactly why medical care is so expensive. Insurance – or worse yet gov’t programs – will only pay some percentage of the prevailing cost. So how do you maintain profit? Simple, you charge a whopping amount for the product or service so that the discounted rate is profitable.
April 26th, 2012 at 13:33
The problem lies in the third-party-pay system, be that third party an insurance company or the government.
Once a third party enters the transaction, there is no longer any incentive to keep prices low.
The patient doesn’t care, because he/she doesn’t have to pay.
The provider doesn’t care, because it’s more money for him/her.
The payer doesn’t care, because they can always raise rates (or taxes) to offset costs and maintain profitability.
I was supremely disappointed in the Obamacare fiasco not because it’s ‘creeping socialism’ or any such other partisan nonsense, but because it doesn’t address the problem. Somewhere along the line the debate turned from affordable health care to affordable health care insurance, and nothing has been or will be done about the actual cost of care.
The answer is to return to a first-party-pay system while increasing competition through graduating more doctors–but that’s a discussion for another day.