British Expats - $750B wasted healthcare?

British Expats (https://britishexpats.com/forum/)

- USA (https://britishexpats.com/forum/usa-57/)

- - $750B wasted healthcare? (https://britishexpats.com/forum/usa-57/%24750b-wasted-healthcare-770941/)

$750B wasted healthcare?

Quote:

America spent $2.6 trillion on health care last year; about one in every six dollars went into the health-care system. A third of that spending — a full $750 billion — did nothing to make anyone healthier.

That’s the big takeaway from an Institute of Medicine report out Thursday, which looks at our big health-care spending problem. The report clocks in at a hefty 381 pages, but there are two graphs, in particular, that I found helpful in thinking about wasteful health-care spending.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/...s-explain-why/

Nice, simple break down in the link...

So anyone else experience wasted spending?

We've got EI, after an annual evaluation, we don't really need it, but they did their best to make sure the little one did, only because our insurance is paying it completely, but as soon as that changes and we might have to pay out of pocket, it'll be dropped. Seems a little daft.

The other big one is you get blood work done at your PCP for something and they refer you, even to a related hospital, the specialist will still run those same tests. Does seem a little bit of a waste.

Oh and when we were having a baby, at the hospital, the chap doing the scan said we could have an extra scan, would only take 15 minutes, didn't really need to do it but that it was covered by our insurance so we wouldn't have to worry about the $750 fee...seriously, you can split that money with us if you're scamming the insurance, you cretin.

Re: $750B wasted healthcare?

This seems to be a strong argument for a single payer system. Not sure about the Affordable Care Act reforms that are gradually being phased in.. In terms of whether or not it addresses any of the waste that the "monster graphic" details. It'll be worth seeing if this IoM report is seriously addressed in the election process...

Re: $750B wasted healthcare?

The US is certainly more extreme than say the UK, but they all have issues.

Increasing demand reducing ability to afford it.

Will be a Big Bang.

Re: $750B wasted healthcare?

Just an example of bad pricing. My wife was having several blood tests a week for a couple of weeks, always the same and using the same lab order. Lab one billed $600 odd dollars for the tests and was paid $129. Lab two billed $127 and was paid $38. The labs are within a few miles of each other, one is at a satellite office of a major health system in the city, the other is a hospital that's owned by the same health system. I think as more people start using HSAs that some of the waste and pricing will start to go down since you are responsible to pay for services 100% at first. Once I got the bill for $127 when I could have paid $36, guess which lab was used from then on?

Re: $750B wasted healthcare?

I wonder about those numbers.. but it was worse before DRGs.