Big Medicine driving up prices?

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Darwin333

Lifer
Dec 11, 2006
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hey dumbasses, I'm a CFO of a hospital, i know exactly what all this shit costs.

You will have to forgive everyone for not assuming you are a CFO at a hospital with your great debating skills and masterful use of insults when they are not necessary nor warranted. So, I assume that you are scanning some proof of this "hidden hardware cost" that you factually stated that Oklahoma Surgery Center uses to screw over their patients? I would assume it would be easy for a person in your position to provide something other than your poorly written and insulting responses.
 

Darwin333

Lifer
Dec 11, 2006
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That is a easy thought to answer. They are losing business in that all the doctor offices are being bought up by these large medical groups. When this happens, the smaller places lose business because all the referrals they sent to the smaller imaging places are no longer happening. I think part of that is addressed in the OP article...yup found it...

Ahhh, that makes sense, sorry I missed it.

How can you compete on a level playing field when the majority of the doctors who sent business your way are now employed by a company who offers the same product you do... at a much higher price. Of course, the patients don't know it is a higher price because they aren't told. My doctors try to pull the same shit and I push back. Thankfully my health insurance shows me estimated cost by location so I get a "basic" idea as to what the cost will be. Unfortunately, it isn't always accurate as it is based on the last claim for that service received from that location.... which can be rather skewed it seems. According to my health insurance my MRI at my currently place will cost $148... yet it would cost me $1000 out of pocket from a hospital a few miles away. I don't honestly believe it would be that high, it was probably due to some other service thrown in the same claim.

Like I said, hospitals are forced to (and I mean quite literally forced by the .gov) to cost shift whereas a standalone imaging center wouldn't have barely any cost shifting at all. If the hospitals didn't do the cost shifting they would all be out of business and we wouldn't have any access. I don't know what the final answer is but they all pretty much suck considering the political climate.
 

Darwin333

Lifer
Dec 11, 2006
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I agree with this 100% and their lobbyist must have greased quite a few palms to get left out of the mix. ;)

Yes, yes they did. In one of the articles I linked (I think) it even talks about how well the lobbyists did to keep Pharma from being the "bad guys" and how it was mostly the health insurance companies that were portrayed as the bad guys during the entire debate. Tauzin was evidently getting scared and had to call Obama out in the press to make sure he stuck to the deal. That tells me the concessions they agreed to are small fries compared to what should have happened or what was on the table (drug importation and negotiation).