Moving to a universal healthcare system with everything run by the Federal government might not solve all the problems in our healthcare system, and it might not really reduce all of our healthcare costs, but at least it would give us someone to hold accountable for rising costs, challenges with accessing care, and questionable quality … Continue reading Thoughts on Health Insurance Companies
Month: May 2020
Healthcare Stagnation
We are facing a disastrous healthcare stagnation in the United States. Our hospitals are getting older, Medical providers are aging with too few young providers to replace them, and the quality of care that many of us experience is not getting much better. Despite this, the cost of healthcare has been soaring. Healthcare expenditures, including … Continue reading Healthcare Stagnation
A Program that Invests Locally
Harris Rosen runs a hotel chain in Orlando Florida. He has eight hotels in total, and his company does something almost no other companies in the country do. They provide real, meaningful healthcare services to their employees. They save a ton of money on healthcare by actually providing more of it, and better quality services … Continue reading A Program that Invests Locally
Healthcare Price Transparancy
Have you ever tried to figure out what a healthcare procedure is going to cost you before you have the procedure? Almost no one can give you a straight answer, and it takes a long time to get a number at all because the doctor's office has to check with your insurance to see what … Continue reading Healthcare Price Transparancy
Health Insurance Company Games
Dave Chase's book The Opioid Crisis Wake-Up Call was an interesting read because Chase highlights many of the health insurance company games that add to the cost of healthcare in the United States without providing additional value. I'm skeptical of health insurance companies, and Chase's book discusses some of the nitty-gritty details of misaligned incentives … Continue reading Health Insurance Company Games
Pay and Chase
If you were working to set up a healthcare plan for your employers, you would want to make sure that payments by the insurance plan were quick so that your employees were not constantly bombarded by letters and phone calls from doctors offices asking when they would be paid by the insurance plan. You also … Continue reading Pay and Chase
GoFundMe for Healthcare
We all complain about our personal healthcare costs and we know that healthcare spending in the US is a huge percentage of GDP, but what isn't clear is that the vast majority of spending and healthcare costs come from a small minority of patients. Cancer care, treatment for severe trauma, and therapy for rare diseases … Continue reading GoFundMe for Healthcare
A Story of Healthcare Pricing Failures and Overtreatment
I don't know anyone who would not agree if I said that there was a pricing failure with the way that healthcare operates in the United States. My personal favorite example of this was a story about a person who wanted some type of medical care, but couldn't get it due to complications with payment … Continue reading A Story of Healthcare Pricing Failures and Overtreatment
The Problem with Healthcare Technology
In my last post I wrote about hidden costs of the healthcare system in America. I wrote about tax breaks for employers who offer health benefits, and I wrote about third party insurance preventing the healthcare system from working like a pure market. This post introduces one consequence of the hidden costs of our system … Continue reading The Problem with Healthcare Technology
Hiding the Cost of Healthcare
In the United States, our current system of healthcare coverage is hiding the cost of healthcare. Anyone who has to go to physical therapy, get an MRI, has a child that needs treatment for a disability, or ends up in an ER knows firsthand that healthcare is expensive, but many of them probably don't realize … Continue reading Hiding the Cost of Healthcare