Help..might have to change my Blue Cross/Shield Healthcare..need suggestions

[irish]

It is not the all the doctors fault about the high prices for medical care. It is also the insurance companies who caught the method from the medicare system way back when.

The medical community has been forced to charge more because they won't get paid enough to stay in business. In other words, it is a vicious cycle and I am old enough to remember the 60"s and when medicare went into effect. Everybody thought it would be so great---the government would take care of us all. That is when the rules and regs started that also caused the increase in the prices.

Anytime you have government making rules and regulations to run the medical system the cost of doing business goes up. I am not trying to be a rebel rouser about this. I am just speaking from experience working in the medical community. Everytime the states and feds make more laws the medical institutions need to hire more help and cross more t's and dot more i's in order to stay afloat,

The problem is that the majority of people do not realize how restrictive all these rules and regs are. It used to be that we had to chart something in one or 2 places on the chart. This is when we had to do it by hand. Now they use the "hard copy" which was supposed to make life easier. Trouble is we now have to have the same information in 4,5,6,7,8,9,10 places which makes the need for more people to input the information. Then, what the nurses want to know is who in the heck is reading all this darn information.

Hospitals are needing to build on to make more room for "records" which are backed up on disc to save room, only it ends up that they are losing more of the info because humans inputing information to be saved is not as accurate as writing it all down. The whole thing is a mess. This is half the reason the medical care cost so much. Has nothing to do with the actual care of the patient. It is trying to keep abreast of all the rules and regs.

I would have the "state" yearly inspections to nursing homes come and follow me around while making medication pass. They watch everything you do. I made the remark one day to one of the state surveyors that it is very hard to get just one drop in a patients eye. The patients can't bend their heads, etc. Anyway, I did everything right, but because I made that one remark the nursing home had a warning written up against it with so many days to respond aboaut how to manage the passing of eyedrops. Told the Director of Nurses I would never open my mouth again!!!!

It took lots of paperwork and time to address this little fricking issue. I could go on and on. The nursing homes need to be checked on, but our home was very good and got very little infractions. One year we had none and you know what happened. The Feds came to inspect us. They spent 2-3 days in this little nursing home trying to make sure that we didn't really have a lot of mistakes.  Like the state could not be trusted to survey us and report its findings.

The stress that is caused by these inspections is hard on the staff even when everything is all right. It is hard having people breath down your neck for 8 hours-10 hours a day trying to catch you do something wrong. Enough of my soap box.Such is life and I sure wish something could be done to make life easier for everyone as far as the medical insurance and coverage goes.

I don't think that anything mentioned has the right recipe to solve the problems yet. Doubt it ever will as it has grown into a giant problem---even in the foreign countries it is ballooning out of control from what I have read. Too many people getting older and sicker. Also, all the new technology is making life more complicated---more cost and more decisions. Irish

Sorry, I got on my band wagon again. Just ignore me!!!!

[warmwaters]

Go to medicare.gov, they have a really good site that shows you what plans are available in your area. You can put in info about your current drugs, etc. and they'll give you an estimate about what you'll end up paying. I'm currently shopping for my medicare plan for next year, so I've been using it a lot. They cover supplemental plans, prescription drug only.  I think it's a good site, and I'm sort of picky about web sites.

Ooops...sorry guys, Im in Michigan....guess I will need to do some research. I cant go to any hospital that doesnt accept my insurance. I think by the end of the year, hoping both parties will work this out..sure they will. I cant imagine everyone cancelling their BCBS. Both parties are at fault...our entire system is just nuts!!!

Gursie

[gurs]

I agree Warmaters.....I used the Medicare.gov website last year when searching for a new prescription provider other than BCBS..they wanted $81.00 a month. I found that Wellcare offered me a cheaper plan and it was recommended for the meds I take etc. I tried them and LOVE them!
Im saving around $30.00 a month, and have no co-pays at all, and they covered some things that BCBS didnt..pays to shop around.

Gursie

[irish]

gurs, Are you on a medicare supplement for your secondary carrier?? Were you on the medicare Blue rx before changing to this drug insurance. Can't remember where you are at. Irish

[gurs]

Yes, BCBS of Michigan is my secondary, Medicare my primary. I just found out that our major hospital (Beaumont) is not going to be accepting Blue Care Network, which is different that what I have, so hopefully, I wont have to change anything. But, it leaves me wondering what would happen if they suddenly do mine next year, when I wont have an option to change? all very confusing. Im still going to research this further..guess we have until Dec 7th of this year to make any changes, instead of Dec 31st.

Gursie