What do you think about the Affordable Care Act?

Now more than ever it is important that you take responsibility for your health. The Affordable Care Act (ACA) is upon us.Many concerns exist about what this means for you and me. It is believed that the ACA is going to drive up healthcare costs for the consumer who is currently covered by an employer sponsored healthcare plan. Health insurance carriers will be required to cover employers’ employees regardless of pre-existing conditions. This cost will be passed on to the consumer through higher insurance premiums and taxes. We all will pay. It is believed that the ultimate goal is to force everyone into universal healthcare. There is concern that people will not be able to afford the “Affordable Care Act”. I have to admit that understanding all the ins and outs of the ACA and its implications are difficult to follow.

If this is not scary enough, your access to healthcare potentially will worsen. This is through longer waits to get into your healthcare provider, longer waits to have a needed treatment or procedure, and availability of experienced healthcare providers. There are healthcare providers leaving jobs they love through early retirement or changing careers completely as the current system has become overly regulated and burdensome. Others are opening a cash pay only practice or health cooperatives where you pay a membership to join. This puts control of your health back in the hands of you and your provider. It allows you time to tell your story to your provider and the provider time to listen. It also alleviates the overhead costs of running a healthcare practice through a web of burdensome governmental and insurance company regulations. Any time you visit your healthcare provider there are several of these regulations built into every medical visit that your provider has to address to be in compliance. Once they have ticked all the boxes for this, there is very little time left to “hear you”. This is frustrating for you and your healthcare provider. This leaves little room to care in healthcare in a therapeutic and meaningful way.

I may be naïve, but it seems to me we all would be better served if some simple and less complicated changes were made. I do believe people should not be denied healthcare for pre-existing conditions and competition between insurance carriers across state lines should be allowed. Furthermore our healthcare costs would go down if healthcare prevention was about more than making sure you have had your lipid screening, mammogram, colonoscopy, pap smear, etc. Not that these are not important, but prevention should focus on how stress, the environment, exercise, the foods we consume, sleep quality, and meaningful relationships affect our health. Addressing these factors will help keep us well so that that when we have important health screenings, they will have a greater chance of being normal. Our quality of life and healthcare outcomes will improve thereby reduce cost. What do you think?

2 Comments

Alicia Nossov on October 24, 2013 at 9:14 pm

IMHO- what happened when insurance companies got more and more involved in healthcare decisions? Consumers paid for healthcare, and paid a little extra to an insurance company in case of a medical crisis that required expensive care. Time went by. The insurance industry makes more and more decisions about what needs to be done, what can’t be done, and how it all needs to be documented. Instead of writing 4 or 5 sentences, doctors write four or five pages to justify medical decisions to all the people who need to approve of what happens between a doctor and a patient. Now a whole new layer of paperpushers will be involved in medical decisions. Where does the money come from to pay all the different people who “approve” of your care? How do you feel about the public school system? Does anybody really think government involvement in healthcare will be “better” than government involvement in education?
I think it would have been much better to dump billions into the public health departments to allow everybody with a family income 200% of poverty guidelines to receive care for free, with a sliding scale allowing anybody to receive care at low cost. People with resources won’t wait for hours if they don’t need to.

Laura Dankof on October 25, 2013 at 6:44 am

Alicia, thanks for your passionate comments. I have not spoken to anyone that feels the ACA is going to make their lives better. You are write about the paperwork. With all the government and insurance regulations currently built into healthcare, it is getting between me and my patient and the delivery of the services they need. I think more and more people will continue to turn to alternative and complimentary healthcare where they at least feel they have a say and are a more active participant.

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Alicia Nossov on October 24, 2013 at 9:14 pm

IMHO- what happened when insurance companies got more and more involved in healthcare decisions? Consumers paid for healthcare, and paid a little extra to an insurance company in case of a medical crisis that required expensive care. Time went by. The insurance industry makes more and more decisions about what needs to be done, what can’t be done, and how it all needs to be documented. Instead of writing 4 or 5 sentences, doctors write four or five pages to justify medical decisions to all the people who need to approve of what happens between a doctor and a patient. Now a whole new layer of paperpushers will be involved in medical decisions. Where does the money come from to pay all the different people who “approve” of your care? How do you feel about the public school system? Does anybody really think government involvement in healthcare will be “better” than government involvement in education?
I think it would have been much better to dump billions into the public health departments to allow everybody with a family income 200% of poverty guidelines to receive care for free, with a sliding scale allowing anybody to receive care at low cost. People with resources won’t wait for hours if they don’t need to.
- Laura Dankof on October 25, 2013 at 6:44 am
  
  Alicia, thanks for your passionate comments. I have not spoken to anyone that feels the ACA is going to make their lives better. You are write about the paperwork. With all the government and insurance regulations currently built into healthcare, it is getting between me and my patient and the delivery of the services they need. I think more and more people will continue to turn to alternative and complimentary healthcare where they at least feel they have a say and are a more active participant.