Public Option Might Reduce Claim Rejections

by Deb Cupples |  If you still doubt the need for a public, non-profit health insurance option, check out Pam Spaulding's Salon article, entitled What if Your Health Insurance Company Says No.  Here are  a few snippets:

"I'm not going to debate the merits of one plan or another here; I'm just looking at healthcare as a "frequent flyer" consumer with pre-existing conditions who sees doctors and specialists several times a year, and has adequate insurance that still has left me with long waits to see a specialist (3 months is not unheard of), and dealt with substandard care.

"In our current system nearly everyone has horror stories about waiting for insurance to approve the most basic common sense things -- like one extra day in the hospital after a c-section, or trying to get a medication not yet in generic form that you and your doctor know works and the insurance company insists on a different generic substitute or you pay outright.

"The number and type of what I call 'drive-by' surgeries, where they kick you to the curb a couple of hours after you've been opened up on the table is astonishing -- they wanted to do that for my gall bladder surgery and I begged to stay overnight because I've had complications after ambulatory surgery before that landed me back in the ER the next day. Thankfully it was approved, because I was right -- I developed a fever and had serious difficulties that I wouldn't have been able to manage at home."

"But what if the insurance company had said no. That happens all the time. It happened to me several years ago, I wasn't able to stay overnight and went into the drive-through surgery; I developed a serious staph infection. It required a second surgery a couple of weeks later. A little time and attention would have saved everyone a lot of grief...." (Salon)

I urge you to check out the Salon article (via Memeorandum) -- and my co-blogger WMD's piece, My Health Insurance Blues. 

Other Buck Naked Politics Posts:

* Business Columnist Refutes GOP Health Care Talking Points

* Were Health Care Reform Protests Industry-Staged?

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* Are Polls and Media Misleading Us re: Health Care?

* Public Option Needed Because Private Insurers Are Robbing Us

* More on Blue-Dog Tie$ to Health Indu$try

* Cash-Conscious Doctors Against Public Health Coverage

* Still More Specious Arguments re: Health Care Reform

* Death by Hospital (infection)

* Private Insurers Milking Medicare

* Insurance Companies Get Away with Overbilling Medicare

* Contractor Fraud: Driving up Healthcare Costs?

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