i suffer no illusions that this will be an easy process. it will be hard. but i also know that nearly a century after teddy roosevelt first called for reform, the cost of our health care has weighed down our economy and the conscience of our nation long enough. so let there be no doubt: health care reform cannot wait, it must not wait, and it will not wait another year."
the president's american recovery and reinvestment act protects health coverage for 7 million americans who lose their jobs through a 65 percent cobra subsidy to make coverage affordable.
the recovery act also invests $19 billion in computerized medical records that will help to reduce costs and improve quality while ensuring patients' privacy.
$1 billion for prevention and wellness to improve america's health and help to reduce health care costs;
$1.1 billion for research to give doctors tools to make the best treatment decisions for their patients by providing objective information on the relative benefits of treatments; and
$500 million for health workforce to help train the next generation of doctors and nurses.
guiding principles
president obama is committed to working with congress to pass comprehensive health reform in his first year in order to control rising health care costs, guarantee choice of doctor, and assure high-quality, affordable health care for all americans.
comprehensive health care reform can no longer wait. rapidly escalating health care costs are crushing family, business, and government budgets. employer-sponsored health insurance premiums have doubled in the last 9 years, a rate 3 times faster than cumulative wage increases. this forces families to sit around the kitchen table to make impossible choices between paying rent or paying health premiums. given all that we spend on health care, american families should not be presented with that choice. the united states spent approximately $2.2 trillion on health care in 2007, or $7,421 per person - nearly twice the average of other developed nations. americans spend more on health care than on housing or food. if rapid health cost growth persists, the congressional budget office estimates that by 2025, one out of every four dollars in our national economy will be tied up in the health system. this growing burden will limit other investments and priorities that are needed to grow our economy. rising health care costs also affect our economic competitiveness in the global economy, as american companies compete against companies in other countries that have dramatically lower health care costs.
the president has vowed that the health reform process will be different in his administration - an open, inclusive, and transparent process where all ideas are encouraged and all parties work together to find a solution to the health care crisis. working together with members of congress, doctors and hospitals, businesses and unions, and other key health care stakeholders, the president is committed to making sure we finally enact comprehensive health care reform.
the administration believes that comprehensive health reform should:
reduce long-term growth of health care costs for businesses and government
protect families from bankruptcy or debt because of health care costs
guarantee choice of doctors and health plans
invest in prevention and wellness
improve patient safety and quality of care
assure affordable, quality health coverage for all americans
maintain coverage when you change or lose your job
end barriers to coverage for people with pre-existing medical conditions
please visit www.healthreform.gov to learn more about the president's commitment to enacting comprehensive health reform this year.
maybe it's me but the word "reform" sparks more anxiety then it does hope for the future. i suppose only time will tell. though i must say i didn't appreciate that our president only included registered nurses in his estimation as "nurses" on the one video i have attached. perhaps i am just being too easily insulted but i worked to become a nurse as well even if that means i'm not a registered nurse. as well such is life...
If you financially reward certain behavior you will get more of that behavior. It is human nature. Currently the rewards in delivering health care are perversely set up. The more procedures you do the more you make, if you can stabilize a chronic illness you make more money then if you cure or prevent that illness, if you make a mistake and the patient gets sicker you are know treating a sicker patient and you earn more money, the more patients you see in the shortest time the more money you make (and probably miss some important facts); the previous are just a few examples of what needs to be reformed.
Should health care only be for profit? Should health insurance only be for profit? Should care of our fellow humans be important or should it be over ridden by profit?
The dynamic conflict for profit vs non profit health care has been going on for well over a century. Currently, and the recent past, the for profit side has been the more powerful force.
To me health care reform is about putting a balance between these two forces.
So are you saying that you are working as a nurse, not to make money, but just to help people? How much free work do you do as a nurse. Do you do any mission work? How many times have you been unhappy about nurses pay? Is this your way of saying that doctors are money hungry and don't care about their patients, deliberately leaving people with issues to guarantee residual income? I think your post is severely unprofessional and accusatory. By the way, when the government controls healthcare, the doctors will no longer make all of the money, it will just line the pockets of politicians and their supporters.
How do Australia, Canada, and the Scandinavian countries do it? I've chatted with Canadians and Australians, and the ones I've talked to think we are crazy for not wanting a system such as theirs as most times it works very well. I don't think we need to reinvent the wheel here. But something has to be done. Turning health care into a business was a big mistake. The well-being of people gets pushed aside for the well-being of the bottom line of the insurance company and the huge corporate hospital. I'm being asked to do more with less in my job while the CEO of the company I work for made 5 million dollars last year in wages. That doesn't include all the 'extras' he got from the drug companies, etc. The big players like the corporate hospitals, drug companies, the AMA, and powerful lobbyists stand to lose a lot if health care is overhauled. In turn, the politicians stand to lose a lot because some of their biggest backers are the drug companies, and the AMA. So somehow I doubt we'll see much 'reform' as too many ultra-rich and powerful people will have to let go of some of their wealth in order for it to happen, either through limiting their power or making them pay their fair share of taxes.
Ad hominim. Cool. The point is wrong, because you do not believe the messenger. Guess it would be correct if Rush Limbough, said that "intelligent" people believed it to be true.
Tencat says that "turning healthcare into a business was a mistake", and while I agree wholeheartedly with the sentiment behind this remark, Woodenpug has a point, Health Care is not in the Bill of Rights. Neither was Woman's Suffrage, or the End to Slavery. An amendment to the Constitution was required to obtain both of these goals.
Other than these Constitutionally guaranteed rights, I guess it is true that the US accomplishes its goals using the 'profit' model, 'the unseen hand' of Adam Smith, and all that stuff. The US has, after all, a 'Capitalist Economy', (I mean,subjective, emotional arguments about what the word 'Capitalist', may or may not imply, that is the economic system that the US runs on). It just seems so crude and inhumane to apply this kind of standard to Health Care. I mean, were talking about the lives and health of our own precious family members, not to mention ourselves.
With that in mind, Woodenpug, thanks for the link to the OMB's outline of the Health Care plan. I glanced at it, I guess it would behoove me to read it carefully if I want to discuss the topic with youall.
I guess that after the 'Reform' is passed the discussion can move past where we are at now, e.g., "should we have Health Care Reform", to, "we now have Health Care Reform, look at this or that specific problem with it", and so start fine tuning from that point.
I am a fan, theoretically, of the Health Care plans of Australia, Canada, the Scandinavian and other European countries.
I am an actual user, through my husband, of the German Health Care system. And, just like many others who chime in on these sites about their experience with other systems of Health Care, I am satisfied with the care in German system, (hey, it beats nothing, which is what I get here-except for the VA, which is not so easy to access if one does not live around a VA care center.)
With that in mind, when Ocankhe refers to the "dynamic conflict for profit vs non profit health care going on for well over a century" here in the US, I guess I can see what Ocankhe is trying to say, but I would have to disagree because, the little bit of historical knowledge I have of Health Care in the US seems to indicate that the 'business' of Health Care, like we are talking about in terms of gulps of over 15% of the GNP of the largest economy in the world, only started after Medicare/Medicaid was instituted in the 60es.
This took 'dispensing Health Care' out of whatever it was before the 60es in the US, which seems to have been a quasi-business/religious -'dispense alms to the poor' model, to an actual business.
The 'business' of Health Care has picked up speed, I can verify from my own observations since working as a nurse since mid 1980es, with the advent of new procedures and medicines.
This 'business model' of Health Care has then been filtered through the particular 'Cultural Lenses' of different sections of American Society (which can be REALLY different, from section to section of the US, as opposed to to the 'Linguistic' and, for want of a better word, 'Tribal', type of homogeneity found in European Countries, and, to a certain extent, expected of immigrants to these countries) to give the types of spending results that Soyrizo's link to the NewYorker story "The Cost Conundum" showed exist in Health Care spending in the US.
After thinking about what Woodenpug said, I guess that since this IS the US, for those of us (like Me) who would like to see a more encompassing "European" type model of Health Care reform in place it may be time to 'get over it' and get familiar with the possibilities being worked on, hopefully in good faith, by the congress and the President.
What has finally become crystal clear to everyone is that SOMETHING must be done.
To me Health Care Reform is about answering the question;
"Is Health Care a right, or is Health Care a privilege"?
IMHO, it is neither. It is a commodity, a service available for purchase. A necessity, yes, as necessary as food, water or shelter, but a resource nonetheless that must be purchased at a price. The U.S. has some of the safest, cheapest food supply and cleanest, most available drinking water in the world. One would think we could do the same with health care, but it comes at a price.
the president also said if his $787 billion plan was passed that unemployment wouldn't go above 8.5%. last time i checked it was in double digits. i don't believe i thing this guy says. he is a smooth talker but his talk is cheap. his plans for fixing our economy are not. the ana and him are on the wrong path towards healthcare reform. if you really want to lower costs, do some tort reform. cap medical malpractice claims.
unemployment figures are not in the double digits, and have not been that in the usa since after 1999 (the year of the earliest figures i obtained)! i checked the stats today, and they're the same -
in june, 38 states and the district of columbia recorded over-the-month unemployment rate increases, 5 states registered decreases, and 7 states had no change. nonfarm payroll employment decreased in 39 states and the district of columbia, increased in 10 states, and was unchanged in 1 state. full text »
your post is difficult to read, as it goes all over the place - first to your lack of trust in president obama's words, for no apparant reason, except that they're smooth and cheap, according to you. then you state tort reform is the way to fix the economy. huh?! i guess you meant that a law should be passed regarding your other (and last) point, which is the need, you think, for a cap on malpractise claims. i suppose that if the claim was less, than so might the award given the plaintiff, be less...... however that still leaves a judge and/or jury able to award what they see fit, which could be above the claim.
is malpractise cost really the most needed place for reform? i don't think so. perhaps your proximity to docs while peddling drug products has exposed you to too much of their whining about the cost of their malpractise insurance. i sure got an earful during each prenatal visit i made in 1973. hasn't that abated some?
will that happen with this administration?? no way! why? because the trial lawyers are in the back pockets of the democrats. the lawyers are getting reach off of malpractice claims while the rest of the us suffers.
i know few lawyers who get "reach" (i suppose you meant rich......) more than others in that profession, which causes suffering for "the rest of the us". the amount is paid by the insurance company...... and the doctor who was found to be guilty in a court of law goes back to work.......somewhat the worse for wear. i don't think that could, by any stretch reflect national suffering.
i know few lawyers who get "reach" (i suppose you meant rich......) more than others in that profession, which causes suffering for "the rest of the us". the amount is paid by the insurance company...... and the doctor who was found to be guilty in a court of law goes back to work.......somewhat the worse for wear. i don't think that could, by any stretch reflect national suffering.
here is the latest national unemployment rate from the bureau of labor statistics
unemployment rate:
9.5% in jun 2009
historical data
hmmm...9.5% nationally.....i don't know about you but when i practice advanced nursing i round up. 10% looks right. is that not double digits? perhaps you need to retake that medical drug calculation class.
some states even have it higher....michigan is at 15%. isn't this the state where the government has taken over the automobile industry? coincidence?? maybe.
i don't trust any politician. i don't care if they are republican or democrats. i am a libertarian but vote with an educated mind and not by party lines. i trust a nonpartisan governmental office that tells me obama care will do nothing to lower costs.
to answer your other question.....i get concerned about malpractice insurance when i start researching the costs for my own insurance. i will shortly be graduating from crna school. as a rn my malpractice insurace ran a little over $100 a year. as a crna is runs into the tens of thousands of dollars. yes, we need tort reform. yes, it will lower overall costs.
oh....and i did mean reach. it is a play upon words.
Specializes in Education, FP, LNC, Forensics, ED, OB.
Please note that a couple posts have been either edited or deleted.
Please do not exchange insults tit for tat. This does nothing for the thread debate, derails the thread, and sets up situations that could possibly get the thread closed.
I am not a fan of either one of the two 'reigning' Political Parties in the US either. (I used to be, but experience is the BEST teacher.)
I am trying to get away from 'knee jerk' reactions when an issue is brought up for discussion.
I can see that your 'knee jerk' reaction is the cost of insurance in your new position as CRNA (congratulations, by the way, that is quite an accomplishment, !) and actually I can see why, when you objectively told us what your Insurance Burden will be to practice and obtain well deserved fruits of your labors.
Now, maybe the ANA is stirring from an (induced) slumber, and we will see this organization rouse itself and provide some actual personal HELP for some REAL Nursing problems. Something tangible, besides 'position statements'.
I would LOVE to see that. Now, with the 'Reform' on the horizon, lets see what REAL benefits the ANA can get put into any final program for Nurses.
And just tell us 'up front', ANA, "we can only help you if you pay up and join our 'Nurses Union'", and then tell us EXACTALLY what goodies you will get for us Nurses in this up coming 'Reform'.
Wow, I have 'almost' talked myself into rejoining!
Can we start a list for the 'goody bag'?
#1 Mandatory Patient Ratios
#2 Tort Reform
Any other ideas, Nurses?
(As one of my favorite fellow nurses used to tell me, "we Nurses have no one but ourselves to blame for the predicament we are in. Nurses have made up the rules for Nursing". Then she would ask, "when Nurses were making up all these rules, why didn't they say that the DOCTORS should be out on the floor taking care of the patients, and the NURSE would be sleeping in the Call Room, and if they needed a Nurse they could call us to come out to help them". HA, HA, I just loved it when she told me that, talk about a paradigm shift! )
!) and actually I can see why, when you objectively told us what your Insurance Burden will be to practice and obtain well deserved fruits of your labors.
)
DrugReptoNurse
133 Posts
Oh, I'm sure the White House site is going to show a very BALANCED and fair representation of their health care plan.....puhleez!
Just do a google search on CBO Obama health care plan. That is what I did. The first article that came up was this one.
This is NOT a plan that is subtainable or cost effective. Your straw man is on fire.
http://thehill.com/leading-the-news/cbo-healthcare-bill-exceeds-1-trillion-2009-06-15.html