LA2JHB

[QUOTE=nun;10291111]The strength of the NHS is that it delivers care free at the point of service without regard for your ability to pay. That is what makes it better than the US system.

Nun-sure it is "free" but you still pay taxes to support it and it is essentially dysfunctional. It is not better than the US system. I have worked in both and in terms of all clinical outcomes, the US system is far superior and at the end of the day healthcare is about clinical outcomes.

Pomster

having friends who now live in USA, I realise the NHS is fantastic.
Inevitably it cannot continue as it is, since people expect far too much from it and it cannot cope with the never ending demands.

But it is something to be proud of- you can receive excellent medical treatment despite earning a low wage/having a costly illness/having a life long condition.

One very sad thing I read recently brought it home for me: a (US) mother found she had a genetic issue which would make her go blind. Her daughter was tested and had the same thing. The mother nominated the daughter to receive treatment on her health insurance plan, while the mother had no option but to go blind.

I would like to think you would never have to make a decision like that in UK.

OK there are long waiting lists and it is far from perfect (and they should refuse/charge people involved in drunken injuries) but it better than the other extreme.

LA2JHB

But at the end of the day the point is that the clinical outcomes are the worst for certain conditions (eg oncology) in Europe and far far below the clinical outcomes in the USA. Therefore at the end of the day, yes you may not have to make these type of decisions, but the treatment you receive is going to be sub-standard (which also explains the growth in health tourism in countries such as India) and you are far more likely to die from a cancer diagnosis in the UK than in other countries due to the incompetence of the NHS (who by the way refuse to purchase certain cancer drugs which save lives but they consider "too expensive"

Pollyana

Threads merged. One on the subject is enough, especially when the second one appears to have been started just to stir.

Bevm

Not my experience at all, and I've had some experience recently. Talk about one-sided!

The doctor speaking to the BMA obviously has an ax to grind which comes down to "give us more money." It would be nice, but impossible.

In the US, the health care is only great for those with great medical insurance. Some Americans live in enormous houses and own a dozen gas-guzzling cars. That doesn't prove that Americans have a better standard of living. The US spends more on health care for worse overall results, because that money goes to the few rather than being shared among all.

As for private medicine in the UK, I don't know overall, but there's a private hospital across the road from the NHS hospital in Exeter and a number of people told me that it was much inferior. Just anecdotal.

Bev

Bud the Wiser

At the end of the day clinical outcomes are irrelevant if you can't have access to them.

Tel8

Clinical outcomes for those who can pay. Don't forget, plenty of people with serious conditions don't even make it to the hospital room in the US, so if you're only looking at clinical treatment, you have to remember that in terms of the US, the sample size of those actually treated for conditions is much smaller than that of the UK.

robin1234

Life expectancy at birth (according to the 2011 CIA World Factbook.)

USA - 78.37
UK - 80.05

Giantaxe

I guess the NHS is doing a piss-poor job of killing people off then. The bottom line, as others have pointed out, is that access to excellent treatment in the US is often predicated on having excellent insurance, something that many don't have.

That said, I don't particularly favour the NHS approach to the delivery of healthcare. Countries like France, The Netherlands and Switzerland have near-universal coverage, but have much more private provision of services and seem to have better outcomes, particularly in terms of cancer, where the NHS clearly lags.

Pom_Chch

Americans suffering from heart attacks after receiving their medical bills!

robin1234

Problem is the waiting lists. In the UK you have to wait a couple of years before your appointment with the death panel comes up, in the US they see you immediately..

Jerseygirl

nun

I said "free at point of service", it is funded from general taxation and the delivery of treatment is not contingent on the patients ability to pay.

I also work in the in the medical industry for a major US teaching hospital and the standard of treatment is excellent. I do not accept the statement that the US has better clinical outcomes then the UK without references and studies.....I think you'll find some places where the UK is better and visa versa. I would be happy to be treated in either system. However, the US system is far inferior to the UK system in the way it is funded, delivered, it's ridiculous cost, and the percentage of the population that it covers.

I am one of the lucky US residents that has inexpensive and very good health care because I am a state employee. I only pay $50 a month of my $400 premium, I have no deductible, but I do have a co-pay and pay for certain tests. I still have to deal with a stupid amount of paperwork when I see the doctor and I've generally had excellent treatment, but my previous GP was an idiot so I changed. Given reasonable funding and the support of the Government the NHS will continue to be an excellent service, but I fear that we will increasingly see it follow the dysfunctional US model because of vested interests and ideological bias that is blind to the overall good health of the UK populace.

nun

I believe that the US's lower life expectancy than the UK is caused by lack of access to health care. The US has excellent hospitals and doctors, but many US residents can't easily get that treatment. People without insurance will allow chronic conditions to go untreated until they are forced to the emergency departments of a hospital when the illness becomes acute. They will receive good treatment, but it will be expensive and might also be too late for there to be a good outcome.

chris955

That cant be true, you must be making it up How can people in 3rd world UK live longer than Americans, it just aint right I tells ya.