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feastie -> RE: Medicare to stop paying for hospital errors (8/19/2007 7:53:58 PM)
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In theory, this sounds like a great plan. Forcing hospitals to be accountable for their mistakes. Although the article does cite problems which are common in hospitals, such as pressure sores or certain types of infections, negligence on the part of the hospital in many of these situations is not necessarily indicated. As a result, hospitals will be forced to absorb these costs in addition to what they absorb already.
Medicare doesn't pay hospitals what it costs to perform procedures or care for the patient. For example, a Medicare patient receives an encapsulated stent. (A stent is a device which holds a vessel open, allowing good blood flow into and around the heart, generally.) The hospital's cost of the stent is $3,600.00. Medicare only pays $1,800.00. The remainder of the cost is not passed on to the Medicare patient, it's passed on to the patient with private insurance.
So while the Medicare patient will not be responsible for the cost of additional care resulting from any of the regulated problems, you can safely bet that the hospital will raise its costs in other areas to compensate, directly affecting private insurances. This means you, Joe. Medical costs and insurance premiums continue to skyrocket, while coverages dwindle, deductibles grow and red tape blooms.
Hospitals annually write off a huge amount of money to indigent care. Locally, one hospital in particular writes off about 20 million dollars each year. That number is not only staggering, it is growing. More and more people can no longer afford insurance, whether it's offered or not, because of the rising costs.
Predictions have been forecast based on a recognizable trend which is leading to the closure of trauma centers. Of all the needs a hospital meets, trauma is among the greatest, and yet, due to the vicious circle in which our health care providers find themselves between the government, private insurance and the indigent, something must give.
The question is, what is it going be?
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