Almost going full Lorne Kates
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My understanding was that only codes for procedures covered by Medicare were standardized previously.
##CPT History
CPT is owned and maintained by American Medical Association, which has copyright protection on CPT. In 1966, the AMA published the first edition of CPT, which at that time focused on surgical procedures. The first edition sought to standardize terminology and reporting. The second edition, in 1970, expanded CPT’s scope. The third and fourth editions were released in the 1970’s. The fourth edition was a major update, and introduced a system for periodically monitoring and updating CPT. In 1983, the Health Care Financing Administration (HCFA), now CMS, adopted CPT for reporting of physician services for Medicare Part B Benefits. In 1987, HCFA also adopted CPT for reporting outpatient surgical procedures.The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA) required that the Department of Health & Human Services develop standards for electronic data storage and transmission. Four yours later, the Department published the Final Rule, which selected CPT for reporting physician services (and other medical services) and International Classification of Diseases (9th revision, Clinical Modification), also known as ICD-9-CM for reporting diagnosis codes.
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Like I said, he's going to point out that you no longer have the employer's portion of the premium and that you have reduced income from unemployment payments.
Let him
. He originally said " you're completely fucked with no insurance and no way to buy insurance" and he's 100% wrong about it.According to his rules that makes him a liar, too.
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So the AHA accomplished what we already accomplished, but managed to do it by doubling premiums and deductible levels?
and managed to do it without fighting healthcare costs.... making it health-insurance reform and not health care reform
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So the AHA accomplished what we already accomplished, but managed to do it by doubling premiums and deductible levels?
More or less--and a bunch of mindless people like @blakeyrat manage to look at how wonderful Government is--just ask all those vets killed by the VA--and think "yeah, let's have more of that!"
Remember, the federal government couldn't even keep a whorehouse profitable.
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I believe the biggest problem is that people look at the paper, and think, "That's a great idea. Anyone who is against this hates people."
And yet, when confronted with the reality of the results, think it's not right because they're only looking at the results that they like. And somehow weigh those results as so valuable, it's worth all the bad that comes with them.
The problem in America is almost never the laws, but the execution.
And we've moved from laws to committees, and committees undermines the law. Committees don't have to treat people with equal protections, as we see from the IRS. Committees gives the government too much flexibility, because it encourages the laws to be vague.
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I thought we had gap coverage for unemployment.
There's COBRA, but it's only good for a few months. (By law. COBRA providers can choose to offer longer coverage.)
Of course, you still had to pay the premium, which might be hard given now you had to pay the full amount, but you also got unemployment pay.
Yup.
I disagree with the inefficient part.
I worked for a Blue Cross/Blue Shield. They were incredibly inefficient. I have personal experience of this.
But in practice, they turn out the same decline % of coverage.
Either they are lying about their incentives, or they are grossly incompetent.
I already addressed this, I am not going to repeat myself.
If not, then they are also grossly incompetent at reading the law.
Ok, well, I guess you better act all butthurt about it on DailyWTF years later then. Good job.
And that making it single payer based on "they make profit" alone will have little benefit.
Who's making that argument?
Most likely, the government will outsource the insurance to private no matter what. Adding another layer of costs, increasing the premiums even higher.
This makes no sense.
So their single payer solution will baseline be higher in cost for the overhead alone.
This seriously makes no sense. How can cutting-out the Blue Cross/Blue Shields of the world possible make overhead higher? Even if the Feds outsourced?
Leaving the population to say, "we have single payer", while not really doing anything in reality.
The point is that everybody in the country gets baseline medical care. I think that's the right thing to do regardless of who's making "profit" or how much.
I'm going to go the Democrat way of saying "they're too big to fail" by pointing out that the company has more than just a CEO. There are jobs at stake.
I would be overjoyed if everybody working at Premera Blue Cross were fired tomorrow. Overjoyed. Fuck their jobs.
Oh, look who's never heard of COBRA.
I've heard of COBRA, I've been on COBRA. It doesn't last long enough to provide a security net to people with pre-existing conditions who, for example, want to start their own business.
Remember, the federal government couldn't even keep a whorehouse profitable.
I don't give a shit about "profit". What the fuck. Where is that coming from?
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I worked for a Blue Cross/Blue Shield. They were incredibly inefficient. I have personal experience of this
Health insurers are my customers.
The only insurers less efficient than BCBS licensees are... All the other ones. There big elephant insurers are the worst of the worst. The small region BCBSs are actually excellent in comparison.
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This makes no sense.
This seriously makes no sense. How can cutting-out the Blue Cross/Blue Shields of the world possible make overhead higher? Even if the Feds outsourced?
Have you even looked into all the committees and processes added on by AHA?
I've heard of COBRA, I've been on COBRA. It doesn't last long enough to provide a security net to people with pre-existing conditions who, for example, want to start their own business.
It's gap coverage.
Why can't you buy insurance if you want to start your own business?
I don't give a shit about "profit". What the fuck. Where is that coming from?
It's not about profit, it's about maintaining a bottom line.
If the government organization is bleeding money, then the effectiveness is a lie.
Some people have argued that we should keep USPS open no matter how much it bleeds because it is guaranteed by the government. I think that's a fallacious statement.
If it must be kept open, it has to come somewhere near neutral in cost. Even heavily subsidized and still failing.... I don't know what you expect to happen.
Of course the government can continue to steal from us all by printing more money to keep things afloat.
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If they ran like Geico, this conversation wouldn't be happening because people would actually be happy with that level of service.
Guess what Geico has that Premera BCBS doesn't? Competition. Gasp!
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Why can't you buy insurance if you want to start your own business?
If you have a pre-existing condition, you can't buy individual insurance for any reason. THAT IS WHAT WE WERE TALKING ABOUT. DO YOU HAVE GOLDFISH-MEMORY? JESUS MAN.
It's not about profit, it's about maintaining a bottom line.
If the government organization is bleeding money, then the effectiveness is a lie.
I'd rather bleed money on universal healthcare than efficiently spend money on more aircraft carriers.
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I'd rather bleed money on universal healthcare than efficiently spend money on more aircraft carriers.
Or you could do what Australia does, and efficiently spend money on universal healthcare while bleeding it on Joint Strike Fighters.
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Bizarrely, the local BCBSs (which are the ones that trend towards no competitors) are the best of the bunch in terms of organizational efficiency. The large BCBSs are awful. The large self-networked insurers are fucking rolling disasters.
None of them are good.
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If you have a pre-existing condition, you can't buy individual insurance for any reason. THAT IS WHAT WE WERE TALKING ABOUT. DO YOU HAVE GOLDFISH-MEMORY? JESUS MAN.
And I've already said multiple times, this is a part of the law that I agree with.
I don't know why you keep harping on it.
Do we need a 5000 page document to ban pre-existing condition denial?
I'd rather bleed money on universal healthcare than efficiently spend money on more aircraft carriers.
Then you get neither.
If it's bleeding money, there's going to be more and more coverage denial until it covers nothing.
OR
They can print more money until dollar inflates to 3rd world country levels.
Or you could do what Australia does, and efficiently spend money on universal healthcare
Yes, there are other countries that do healthcare insurance better.
But every single country suffers somewhere. In either insurance coverage or in actual health care provision.
No country has the silver bullet, and I've been to each possible system and experienced their healthcare and coverage.
I prefer what China does.
And as our economy creates ways to circumvent AHA (urgent care clinic explosion, subscriptions to specific doctor, monthly fees, where you get service for a monthly fee instead of coverage for a monthly fee), we're looking more like China.
But I'd be willing to bet that China denies more catastrophic claims than we do in America, or has less access to advanced care.
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Point of order that's been pissing me off. It's the Affordable Care Act, or ACA. Not AHA.
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I love it!
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Maybe your commute would be shorter if you didn't stop in a town store every time?
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But at least you pay no taxes for the duration.
No. Income from unemployment insurance is taxed at the same rate as any other ordinary income. Since you're making perhaps 1/3 – 1/4 of your usual income, you may wind up in a lower tax bracket. However, income taxes are withheld (at least in WA) at only 10% (or not at all), so you may wind up owing the IRS a lot in April. And if you're unemployed long enough that you have to dip into your retirement savings to survive, you'll have to pay tax+penalties on that money.
And, of course, you still pay sales and all the other non-income taxes you would normally pay.
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Of course, you still had to pay the premium, which might be hard given now you had to pay the full amount, but you also got unemployment pay.
Which may not even cover the premium, let alone other living expenses. In WA, the maximum unemployment benefit is $637/week (which appears to be the 3rd highest in the country), before taxes. If you choose to have tax withheld to avoid owing the IRS your soul in April, you actually get $597/week. Call that $2594/month, average.
Individual situations will vary a lot, of course, depending on your insurance plan, number of dependents, etc., but for me and my kids, COBRA costs $1006/month. That's 39% of net income.
If you live some place like AZ, where the maximum weekly benefit is $240/week, well, good luck with that.
There's COBRA, but it's only good for a few months. (By law. COBRA providers can choose to offer longer coverage.)
I'm not sure what the legal mandate is, but AFAICR, I've never seen less (or more) than 18 months.The point is that everybody in the country gets baseline medical care.
In theory, at least. In practice, not everybody actually gets it, because some people can't afford the out-of-pocket costs associated with the high deductibles.
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Income from unemployment insurance is taxed at the same rate as any other ordinary income.
Thanks.
That would have been a surprise.
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I actually got the cheque in the mail today.
Unfortunately my bad handwriting caused it to get written out to the wrong name. They managed to misread Peter as Kevin. So now I have to send it back to them and wait for another cheque.
(No, I'm not doxxing myself here, it's easy enough to find my name with any thought whatsoever.)
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Well Kevin, I now know where to send my pet food to now.
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I like meaty pizzas if you're doing that.
Oh wait... that's my old address. They might not appreciate it so much.
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I like meaty pizzas if you're doing that.
Yeah fuck you, you're the one 500 quid richer, you buy the pizza.
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Fuck you, give me money!
I haven't actually gotten the money yet!
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I like meaty pizzas if you're doing that.
Why would I send you pizzas? I have ten kilos of dog food left and the cat has run away. I thought you might like it to feed your tarantulas.Oh wait... that's my old address. They might not appreciate it so much.
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You must be confusing me with that other Arantor, the one who has pets.
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Ah... my apologies. Do you want ten kilos of dog food any way?
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You should send it to Jeff.
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This. So much this.
I'm sure Jeff would appreciate it.
Besides, doesn't he talk about dogfooding on occasion? Surely that's a sign of something!
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@Arantor said:
Will I'm sure as shit paying postage to america. I'll just go home and eat it for a while. Probably the most nutritious stuff in the house at the moment!Besides, doesn't he talk about dogfooding on occasion?
Exactly.
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I'm pretty sure there are people here who would chip in for the shipping on that just for the joy of baiting Jeff.
I would, for example.
Current Procedural Technology: History, Structure, Process & Controversies - Otorhinolaryngology - Head & Neck Surgery
