Death Panels are HERE

By Findalis

The Grouch at Right Truth is a practicing Emergency Room Doctor.  He is a man who doesn't give into hysterics, conspiracies, and tin foil craziness.  So when he speaks out against Obamacare I listen to him.  And you should too.  Having said that, I received this from his lovely wife Debbie of The Right Truth with a plea to pass it along.  That I am doing.

Death Panels are HERE

Today while working my shift in the emergency room, an old lady was brought in very sick and in fact near death. I did my usual workup and evaluation and attempted to administer life saving treatment. It was my plan to admit this woman to the hospital. I found out a little later that this same woman had been a patient here just slightly more than 2 weeks ago with a DIFFERENT DIAGNOSIS. I was told that if this woman was admitted, the hospital would not be paid.

The new Medicare rule now is that if the same Medicare patient is re-admitted to the hospital within 30 days, the hospital will not be paid. When they first started this nonsense they said this only applied to patients with the same diagnosis. Now they have "expanded" the rule to include re-admissions for any reason. So if you're in the hospital for pneumonia, and 3 weeks later, you break your leg.......too bad. Medicare will not pay the hospital to fix your leg.

A little later a man was brought in by ambulance, very sick, in pain, and near death. I did my usual evaluation and treatment, doing my best to ease pain and stabilize this man's illness. He needed to be admitted. To my chagrin I found out that he had been treated for the SAME problem at a DIFFERENT HOSPITAL about 10 days prior. If I admitted this man, our hospital would be paid nothing. I admitted the man.

My friends I am caught in a terrible position. I could have given treatment to both of these people and sent them out. There is no doubt that both of them would have died. Oh, I could also be sued for malpractice, but nobody cares about that. That's why we have insurance, right?

My other choice is to admit the person, knowing full well that the hospital will have to absorb the cost of care without hope of remuneration.

This is the climate we as healthcare providers find ourselves in today. How many small and struggling hospitals will survive under such ludicrous payment schemes? Indeed many facilities will close their doors. Many doctors will retire early or simply go do something else. As more and more are added to the Obamacare rolls, there will be less and less access. People will get sicker and yes, people will die because of it.

I had a sick and sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach today after both of these incidents. We have a good hospital. Our nurses, technicians, and support staff work very hard and they deserve to be paid for their efforts. I am not so worried about myself as I am near retirement, but I worry for all the younger folks in the healthcare business and I worry about our seniors who are in the long run going to be sacrificed as the government implements cost cutting shenanigans to cover up their broken promise made way back in 1964.

Folks, this is a nightmare!

Remember when Nancy Pelosi said that we had to pass the bill to know what was in the bill?  We now know what is in the bill.  AND WE DON'T LIKE IT!

If you will, please pass this along.  Either through Facebook, Twitter and/or on your own blog.  And remember to vote on Nov. 6th to remove the problem that caused this disaster:  President Barack Hussein Obama.

Mayo Clinic Arizona Drops Medicare! Happy New Year Seniors!

by Maggie at Maggie’s Notebook

Happy New Year Seniors! A little prezzy from the Prez: Medicare patients have been kicked out of the Mayo Clinic’s Glendale, Arizona facility. It’s a happy, happy day for the Obamas. They are soon to hold your health care in their sweaty, greedy, grabby hands and they can't wait.

“No Medicare patients” beginning today, at the Mayo Glendale facility (a suburb of Phoenix). This is a two-year-trial-run. About 3,200 patients are affected. Needless to say, the Glendale area is rife with retirees:

Obama in June cited the nonprofit Rochester, Minnesota-based Mayo Clinic and the Cleveland Clinic in Ohio for offering “the highest quality care at costs well below the national norm.” Mayo’s move to drop Medicare patients may be copied by family doctors, some of whom have stopped accepting new patients from the program, said Lori Heim, president of the American Academy of Family Physicians, in a telephone interview yesterday….

Mayo’s hospital and four clinics in Arizona, including the Glendale facility, lost $120 million on Medicare patients last year, Yardley said. The program’s payments cover about 50 percent of the cost of treating elderly primary-care patients at the Glendale clinic, he said.

If you are now on Medicare, but want to continue to be treated at Mayo-Glendale, here is what they have planned for you:

A Medicare patient who chooses to stay at Mayo’s Glendale clinic will pay about $1,500 a year for an annual physical and three other doctor visits, according to an October letter from the facility. Each patient also will be assessed a $250 annual administrative fee, according to the letter. Medicare patients at the Glendale clinic won’t be allowed to switch to a primary care doctor at another Mayo facility.

A few hundred of the clinic’s Medicare patients have decided to pay cash to continue seeing their primary care doctors, Yardley said. Mayo is helping other patients find new physicians who will accept Medicare.

Mayo’s decision may herald similar moves by other Phoenix- area doctors …“We’ve got doctors who are saying we are not going to deal with Medicare patients in the hospital” because they consider the fees too low, Rivers said. “Or they are saying we are not going to take new ones in our practice.”

DoctorRX at Naked Capitalism says the following about Medicare patients paying cash and receiving treatment (referring to the same article I have quoted above):

Despite what the article says, It’s not easy under the regs to just charge cash. So I’m not sure what Mayo is referring to. Basically a physician has to drop out of being a Medicare provider in toto in order to then charge freely. Once out, I think you’re out for a whole year (at least). And that includes seeing a patient in hospital who’s a Medicare patient (Medicare “A” covers essentially all Medicare patients). So for a whole year the doctor has to only treat outpatients and have nothing to do with Medicare. Not easy. Especially if Glendale has an elderly population.

Obama’s health care plan is not yet law, but he has his ball rollin’ anyway.