re: #258 notutopia
re: #206 acwgusa

Do you want to know the real reason health care costs are so inflated? One: Malpractice Insurance premiums. The hospital system my mother works for pays 20% off the top for malpractice insurance! 20%! And as far as Medicaid reimbursement.

Two: Drug costs. And I am not talking necessary life sustaining drugs. I’m talking Viagra, and other lifestyle drugs.

Three, ridiculous health regions, with no competition in certain regions. HMO and PPO’s are locked into zones, with no chance of expansion or competition.

Four, lack of trained, professional nursing staff. Nursing is always, always understaffed, and we don’t turn out enough health care workers to cover that, because it isn’t a glamorous position.

None of these, with the exception of three, is anything government policy can fix.

And frankly, I wouldn’t trust a US government health database anyway. Especially those being run by Obama’s former campaign website staff.

No argument from me. Except that the government could effect tort reform, if it had the will. No sign of that on the horizon. Don’t expect it from this administration for sure.

Nursing is extremely understaffed, but I’m not sure that it’s for lack of trying. I think it’s just too hard a job for too little pay, and not enough people are interested in it. We are importing nurses from third world countries (Philippines, for example) to make up the shortfall. I’m not aware of the nursing malpractice issue that notutopia pointed out, but will take his/her word for it. It wouldn’t surprise me.

There is also increasing reliance on physician’s assistants and RNs to do some of what doctors used to do, and on LPNs and technicians to do what RNs used to do, for cost savings. Look for more of that, whatever system we end up with.

General point: for anyone who IS interested in a stable job in a declining economy, though—health care is it. Health care industry, as far as I’m aware, has seen no significant decline in business and the baby boomers are going to require a lot of care for the next few decades.