I dont know...we have lots of inequities in this country. The rich have better schools, better food, more extracurricular educational opportunities, more connections for better jobs, etc

It may not be fair, but I think in this country we strive to provide everyone with a chance at that, but no promises

Overall, specialists refused to grant appointments for 66 percent of the Medicaid children, versus only 11 percent of privately insured youngsters.

Those doctors are not in the medical field to treat people but to make money ! It is unethical and immoral!

I have universal health care and one of the best health care system in the world. I get the same care as my politicians. My country is France.

Health care is a right, not a priviledge. America is truely a 3rd world nation, no social programs, no free college education, and no health care for all. You, people have been brainwashed into believing that social programs are socialism, IT IS NOT ! IT IS COMMON SENSE ! Social programs have been created to allow a better quality of life for citizens and governments that give social programs to their people are working FOR THE PEOPLE.

America stincks !

The very large majority of americans that cannot afford health care ARE WORKING AMERICANS ! You cannot afford health care if you make the minimum wage. Period !

Sorry frenchy, I've been to your country, I've gotten sick in your country, you do NOT have the best health care in the world. I'll be in Paris July 5-11th and I'd be happy to discuss with you in person.

This story highlights the exact reason why public option does not work in America. We are too big, too diverse, too many people with too many different illnesses and too many different attitudes towards healthcare. Too much bureaucracy and too much red tape. It may work in France, but who wants to be like the French?

Believe it or not, people like to get paid for the work they do. If you want to attract the best and brightest into the medical field, they have to have incentive to go to med school for 8 years and come out with $250k in debt. You have to have incentive to research and develop a new medication or new medical technology for 10 years and $1B cost. In the end, somebody has to pay for those services. The government never has done a good job of paying up, nor will they ever (clearly highlighted in this story).

Yup those Americans with money get to go to good schools, eat good food, drive nice cars, have a big house, and afford better doctors. That's why I strive to make my life better. You can do it too. Work hard, and you do could be the next rich guy with all the benefits. It's the American dream.

No, you do not have the best health care system, your health care system ranked 37th in 2000, France ranked 1st !

educate yourself.

Start by making your medical schools affordable, that will be a good start.

Medical school in France is FREE.

And yes, the french have the best health care system in the world and it works ! Your nation is a 3rd world nation. 40 000 americans die every year because they can't afford care. This is immoral, unethical and outrageous !

READ YOUR CONSTITUTION ! Health care is a right and not a priviledge. You are in violation of international law ! DO THE RESEARCH !

Lucetmoi, WHO rankings from 11 years ago are skewed, look at the criteria. Please educate yourself on how each country is rated. When cost is the #1 concern, clearly any "free" system (which is not really free) will be ranked higher. Look instead at # doctors, # hospital beds per capita, length of stay for inpatients, use of medical technology, and patient outcome. I'm more concerned with quality and access personally than cost. Furthermore, I never said ours was the best for everyone (it is the best for me though, having experienced health care in france, england, and israel so far), and I said I'd love to have this debate with you in person right in your own country.

What works for you does not necessarily work for everyone, as this story clearly shows. In America we have a different value system and a different economic system. Ignorant suggestions like "free med school" will not work. The slacker kid who dropped out of my highschool should not get a free ride to med school. The hard-working valedictorian of my highshcool who went to Duke undergrad and then Wake Forest Med (both expensive, private schools) is now a GP and serving in our Navy. That's the type of person I want as my doctor, and that's the way our system is set up. There's a reason so many MDs and PhD's come to America for their education then go back to their homeland to practice....that reason is because we produce the best and brightest health care professionals. And every country in the world benefits from our top-tier med schools.

Here are some better suggestions for the US: 1) fund personalized medicine research http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/43417333/. 2) fund cost-comparative studies for all medications and treatments. 3) fund public awareness and education programs about prevention and chronic disease management. 4) don't listen to arrogant French who think they know everything because they have google search engine, having never been here nor experienced our top-notch health care.

MmmMmmBeer
Look instead at # doctors, # hospital beds per capita, length of stay for inpatients, use of medical technology, and patient outcome. I'm more concerned with quality and access personally than cost.

Well, lucky you that you aren't as concerned with cost. Most people are. And, the criteria you listed, those won't matter if people cannot afford access to healthcare to begin with. It seems your judgment is a little skewed simply because YOU can afford it. And, healthcare should work the same for everyone. The rich should not be afforded better healthcare than the poor.

Also, if you dispute another's argument, please use some logic. Saying that 'The slacker kid who dropped out of my highschool should not get a free ride to med school.' is illogical thinking. I'm not supporting the idea of free med school but don't you think rules would be put in place to vet those who may take advantage of this? Geez. Think objectively.

ell, basically what you are saying is that you don't care about the quality or access because the cost is too high? Who cares what the patient outcome is as long as it's affordable, right??? WRONG! In truth, about 85% of Americans have insurance already and can afford/access care quite easily. If you fall into that 15%, then as I said, follow the American dream and pull yourself up by your bootstraps. Additionally, those 15% currently have access through safety net programs which are free to them (and we take on that cost, as we would in a single payer system). The true health CARE stats speak for themselves, health COST stats can be misleading depending what news organization is reporting them.

The suggestions I made will, believe it or not, reduce costs by fixing underlying issues. Most people who study this issue (as opposed to google searching and reading the news) are in agreement with the programs I suggested. The problem is the new HCR law is directly aimed at insurance reform, not CARE reform. The changes do nothing to underlying problems in the actual quality and administration of care. Those politicians have turned the debate into WHO pays, not WHAT we pay for. That is why I am infinitely more concerned with quality and access than cost, the cost side of the equation will balance out once we fix the first two legs.

As for the logic, that was a very logical argument...you start messing with the training and education systems then everything else falls apart. The one sentence you refer to was admittedly a huge exaggeration, but I only went there because Lucetmoi brought it up. We train the best and brightest, and most of those MDs and PhDs take the training they receive here and bring it home. There are many many other things we must change before messing with medical schools (or payors for that matter).

@ Beer
Now I believe you're thinking irrationally. I never said I don't care about quality. What I am saying is when determining worldwide healthcare rankings, costs should be a huge consideration. Your comment "Look instead at # doctors, # hospital beds per capita, length of stay for inpatients, use of medical technology, and patient outcome" indicates that costs should not be a consideration at all. Maybe you were trying to say, "Look also at...". But, you didn't. You excluded costs in your argument, entirely.

Also, playing the percentage game with healthcare (lives) is flawed and misleading. So, as you say, 85% of the people can afford healthcare, which I will conceed. However, that leaves 40+ million people who can't afford it (single people, married couples, parents and by extension, their kids). That's an absurdly high number and unacceptable. In 2009, approx. 60% of the people (individuals, not businesses) who filed for bankruptcy was because of medical emergencies they could not afford due to lack of insurance

Beer: the slacker that dropped out of your high school would not get into medical school. The point is to recruit the best and brightest that would otherwise be driven to other fields because of the cost of medical school. Perhaps without crushing school debt and ridiculous malpractice insurance doctors could pay their bills off medicaid reimbursements. Factor in drug companies that have an 8000% percent markup and most people are screwed. Did you know that the US pays 100% of the R&D costs for the whole world? That's right, because luce's France won't. So for his great system he expects us to shoulder all of the cost and then he will buy the end result for much less and then rave about his system. Develop your own drugs luce, then see how great your medical system is.

All of us in America feel a bit defensive when somebody says "America stinks!" We carried democracy to the rest of the world, and we fought to save France and the rest of the world in World War II. Every year we also have many more natural disasters than Europe. But, EVEN SO, a rich person who has lived in America, France, England, and Israel is no judge of health care systems, because if a cancer treatment is developed in Germany or Switzerland, they will just go there to get it, while the rest of us couldn't possibly afford that. My family has a dear friend born in Canada who receives free healthcare, and he didn't have to come to America to get it. That includes a liver transplant, cancer treatments, etc. The Canadian healthcare system paid for all of it. We have another dear friend, our godfather, who is Republican, and who wrote for a conservative magazine, who moved to Canada so that he could be treated for his Parkinson's disease. He hushed up the fact that he was living in Canada so that he could be treated. Lots of rich people, and that includes Ronald Reagon, have gone to Germany to be treated for cancer and other diseases. America has some very good treatment centers, and mostly they treat people with insurance much better than those who have Medicaid, but even so, often they do not treat people even with insurance. The movie "Sicko" was about people WITH insurance in America, not the uninsured or those on Medicaid. The first example in that movie was of a man in Canada who had his fingers taken off in an accident, and their medical system reattached all of them; in America it showed an INSURED man who had a similar accident, and the insurance company wouldn't allow him to have all his fingers reattached. These were not made-up or exaggerated stories. That movie is a "must see" for anybody who thinks we have a great system here: how about the famous hospital in Los Angeles who shoves the uninsured out the door onto the street right after an operation, with nobody to help them recover, sometimes with an IV bag suspended above them? The flea party would have you think that healthcare is some sort of entitlement, but you cannot get healthcare outside of a group; as an individual, the care is priced out of the range of the middle class. The flea party is a plague on America. Don't vote for them.

Liz I agree with ya 100%, clearly people on this board do not know how to tell exaggeration from fact. And yes, personally I did know that but I'm sure many do not (NCSU MMB, great graduate program combining science/business/healthcare studies...if anyone is interested in a career in healthcare/pharma I suggest checking out this grad school!). But you hit the nail on the head, with med school and graduate school many smart brilliant foreign folks come here for training and then take that training abroad to bolster their own health care systems. Likewise with drug and medtech development which benefits the rest of the world while we shoulder the cost. That's the way they like it and apparently many Americans want it that way too, without understanding what that will do to innovation. That is the view many key opinion leaders share who are involved/study this topic daily.

Ell, please see above, some (perhaps yourself?) do not know how to separate exaggeration from fact. When cost becomes the #1 consideration, then quality and access suffer. The analogy is a three-legged chair...cost, quality, and access. If you shorten or remove one of the legs, the chair topples. When rating criteria places more importance on one leg than the rest, those ratings are skewed/biased. Frenchy was looking only at that statistic and I suggested he look instead at others more directly related to care and patient outcomes (which is the whole reason we need healthcare in the first place). And no I did not exclude cost completely...in fact it was my #2 suggestion on how to fix health care in the US. How about instead of focusing solely on my verbage/word use on a sentence or two, you instead take in the whole of my argument which is a) health insurance reform does not equal health care reform and b) there are ways to improve quality/access which will balance the cost. So please go ahead and dissect this post word by word...my point is made, KOLs agree with me, and I will not be responding.

The thing is, is $100 reimbursement for a 20 minute visit a real loss or is it greed?

Why is any business trying to make a profit immediately labeled as greedy? The $100 for a 20 minute visit is low once you factor in all of the salaries being paid for that hour: doctor, nurses, receptionist, billing clerk. Then factor in office rent, utilities, supplies, malpractice insurance, cost of people who will default on their bills, etc. Then there is the non-billed time at the end of the day when the doctor returns phone calls, finishes charts, etc. It costs money to pay the staff and the expenses. They have to take in more than they pay out to stay in business.

BS

Judi,

what a well thought out, articulate rebuttal

I guess i can remember a time when you went to the dr. it was one dr. and a nurse/receptionist/billing. One dr. was able to take care of a small town of about 1000 people. Now you go to the dr's office, you see a huge support staff and we're supposed to understand that these folks are necessary. Our small rural town of 1500 has a clinic with 9 drs. (plus some specialists that come in on a weekly basis), you walk through a new extensively remodeled lobby with marble floors (that had just been remodeled probably 6-7 years previously).

I was just diagnosed with arthritis and was put on some meds that require bloodwork every other month. While there's a clinic 15 miles to the south of me will do the procedures for $45, this clinic (part of the mayo system) charges $165. But you say we're just supposed to understand that it takes that much to stay in business. I don't think so.

mmm...medicine has gotten a LOT more complicated in the past 50 years. The treatment for a heart attack back then was bedrest. Now we put a stent in, keep you in a CCU, and give you statins, beta blockers, aspirin, plavix, ace-inhibitors.

Is it a lot more expensive and complex--defientely

Does it save lives? MOST definetely

In addition the insurance companies look for ANY loop hole to not pay the claim. ITs takes specialists to bill your insurance company and get the dr reimbursement for that service and while he may bill 100.00 for that 20 minutes, medicaid pays him 10 bucks, medicare about 30 bucks and the rest about 45-50 bucks. That is if your copay isnt larger than their "allowable" reimbursement rate. then its up to you to pay the dr and alot DONT.

thats a great point that a lot of people don't realize. The billed amount, and what the doctor actually collects are 2 very different amounts

Logical-996180
Why is any business trying to make a profit immediately labeled as greedy? The $100 for a 20 minute visit is low once you factor in all of the salaries being paid for that hour: doctor, nurses, receptionist, billing clerk. Then factor in office rent, utilities, supplies, malpractice insurance, cost of people who will default on their bills, etc. Then there is the non-billed time at the end of the day when the doctor returns phone calls, finishes charts, etc. It costs money to pay the staff and the expenses. They have to take in more than they pay out to stay in business.

Because healthcare shouldn't be about profits. It should be about saving lives. It should be about helping a sick baby come down from a 100 degree temperature. It should be about helping a mom or dad fight and beat cancer. It sounds like you're ok with the current state of our healthcare system. I, for one, am not. Healthcare should not be about profits!

"Because healthcare shouldn't be about profits. It should be about saving lives."

This is correct, though until all involved in the medical field buy into this you'll get nowhere. I suggest you start with the drug companies; they have the largest profits of all because people can't tell them to get bent. Nobody has any power over them and nobody can go without their drugs so everyone's screwed.

I'd think people would have a little bit more compassion for children. If you want to be a douche about giving adults health care, that's still messed up but it's one thing, but to deny it to little kids just because you don't think you're raking in enough extra cash is pretty disgusting.

I've seen all of this firsthand...I'm a working mom and my husband works as well, and we still can't afford private insurance for our 5-month old, on top of rent, regular bills, and car maintenance. So when I put my son on medicare, I still can't find quality care for him. I called 15 clinics in my area, and only ONE would agree to see him. They even flat out told me that it was because of the medicare. That's a travesty.

I have regular insurance, I would have to wait 45 days to get an appointment with my pcp. When my child had to see a pediatric cardiologist to evaluate a LOUD murmer, it took 2 months to get an appointment.

And what do you think will happen if we are ALL mandated coverage under a public option? I'll tell you...even longer waits which is EXACTLY what they have in every single-payer system...look up the WHO stats if you don't believe me.

One also has to wonder about the advantages of having to hire extra people to jump though the hoops of insurance companies. And in the end, if they don't pay, how much better off are they than taking the sure fire money from a straight forward system like medicaid?

Medicaid is not straightforward and does not provide sure-fire money. Besides low remimbursement rates, administrative hassle is one of the main reason many providers don't take Medicaid.

I'm not saying I have the answer to this, I'm saying there has got to be a better one.

SPECIALTY care. Yes, I've been to doctor's offices that told me "we do not accept SELF PAY'' That's NOT welfare...that's 'I'll pay you upon leaving." Do NOT go to any University of Tennessee Medical Center doctor affiliates!!

crap I just moved to Knoxville!

The knee surgery that would have put me back on both legs years ago....it's far, FAR too late now....was one of the last ones that Kaiser Permanente gave one of their surgeons a $30K bonus for denying before the Feds went through their entire system and "tore them a new one", as the saying goes. Instead, they told me there was nothing wrong despite the fact that the injured knee was, literally, twice the size of the other one, gave me the keys to an electric scooter, and told me to come back in a year if it wasn't better..

Kaiser is not as lily white as they would like you to believe, trust me.

Kaiser might be O.K. for some conditions, but not for others. My gynecologist who treats me for severe endometriosis wouldn't take Kaiser; they don't have the advanced surgeons to take care of that problem. There is a problem that some procedures are reimbursed at too high a rate, while others are under reimbursed by either insurance or Medicaid. My insurance will cover most things, but my adult daughter can't even get a blood test for her severe anemia, or have her moles checked by a dermatologist, because she needs the primary care doctor to make a recommendation which he won't do, and the specialists won't take her insurance. My grandson has been lucky so far, except that he was sent home with a high fever once. When he was a baby with a speech problem, we found out that all the parents who had good insurance who had children with speech problems, those children were tested for autism by the local hospital, but all those who didn't have the right insurance were told that their children didn't have any of the autism spectrum without any tests. Why were we not surprised?

I watched KAISER deny an ER visit for a heart attack as not a covered medicare benefit. Kaiser is SCUM!

I've had Kaiser coverage from birth till now (30). Admittedly, I haven't had any heart attacks, but they've done very well for me. In the 80's, you could make an appointment and wait in the waiting room for 3 hours even though you showed up on time. After they got "ripped a new one," that stopped. I come in on time, I get seen on time. I can make a same day appointment with any doctor if I'm sick, and schedule ahead with my own doctor for routine appointments.

I hear over and over "Yeah, but you're young. You just don't have the same issues that you do in your 60's!" I have health issues - a spinal deformity that causes me chronic pain, and psychiatric problems when I was younger - and they've been just fine. Their psychiatric care was pretty meh, but it was there.

I have heard that some problems Kaiser treats better than others, and that seems reasonable and true, given my psychiatric care. However, for my work, we can pick Kaiser or Blue Cross/Blue Shield (can't remember which). I've had to drive my friends and relatives to appointments for the latter. Doctors inconveniently located and long waits, but top notch care...when they see you.

It's all on what poison you pick, I guess.

so a program that reimburses so little docs don't want to accept it, you want to expand.

I'm not sure I understand. The market correction will be that no intelligent person will go into medicine in this country when you can make double for half the time committment.

To Eric: You presume that doctors go into medicine only for the money? If that is so, they will limit their practices only to treatments that cost a lot. Not all doctors think that way, even today.

Not only for the money, but no one is going to work for free. And no intelligent person who can make 200K in banking or law is going to go through 4 years of college, 4 years of med school, and 3-7 years of residency/fellowship to be paid a "market rate" as the previous poster stated

Doctors don't limit their practices as you suggest, but certainly most graduating students tend to enter the more lucrative fields such as radiology or anesthesia rather than primary care, which typically pays less. And I for one think its hard to blame them

Eric, doctors used to work for livestock and a sack of potatoes. Because of the cost of their educations and the cost of malpractice insurance, they now need to make hundreds of thousands of dollars each year. Medicaid reimbursements are not low. They are just significantly lower than what private insurance pays, i.e. private insurance reimbursements may be too high.

No Brenda they are BELOW cost. WELL below cost of the supplies and services. Medicaid reimbursement rates are lower than Medicare which is publically known to be lower than cost.

Hate to correct you all, but I am a pediatrician, and i can tell you medicaid reimbursements are not good at all. I accept it. I don't limit the number of patients in my panel nor how many with medicaid I see in a day, but the day may come when it becomes a necessity. I don't work in Illinois, so I can't comment on the accuracy of the numbers in the article, but at least in Missouri, the medicaid reimbursements are nowhere near private insurance.

I didn't go into this field exclusively for money. I could have easily gone for a degree in business or computer science, etc, etc, etc; but I like working with people and watching kids grow and develop. It's much more rewarding than other alternatives for me. That said, I do have my own family to feed, med school loans to repay, malpractice insurance to pay, and my own employees to pay. I love what I do and I love kids, but as my parents reminded me growing up, love doesn't put food on the table. I have over $500K in debt right now between a housing loan, school loans, car loans, and start up costs for the office.

There are also a lot of other things that have to be paid with insurance reimbursements than just my salary. I have other people who work for me (nurses, receptionists, medical assistants). I have to pay overhead for the office space. I have to pay a ton of money for vaccines, which generally don't get fully reimbursed either. So there is no simple answer to this problem.

well said, TJW!

You believe everything that the flea party tells you, until they bite...

My husband had a brilliant surgeon who removed 3/4 of his colon (due to colon cancer) last year. After two weeks in the hospital, he went into a rehabilitation facility for two more weeks. The insurance would have paid for more, but we got him out fast when the facility gave my husband (a cancer patient: very susceptible to infections) a roommate... who was recovering from bacterial pneumonia. They didn't have to disclose the illness (and the illness was not disclosed to them by the hospital) because of G.W. Bush's "Privacy Act," which does nothing to protect you from unscrupulous insurance companies, but keeps life-threatening information away from patients and their families. I'll bet that Kindred is hiding behind Bush's "Privacy Act" too, and the real reason why the "Privacy" is enforced is to prevent class action suits on these kinds of facilities, especially nursing homes, after-care, rehabilitation, etc.

Elizabeth-If you are referring to HIPAA, the Health Information Privacy Act, it originated in 1996 and was sponsored by the late Senator Kennedy. G.W. Bush had nothing to do with it....

I had private insurance. They didn't pay either. The entire system is broken, period.

A doctor I go to won't take Medicaid patients because she only works a few days a week. That's O.K. with me that she works only those hours, but she treats patients with disabling diseases that might not be able to work, people who really need to be seen.

My son's pediatrician has a sign right in the office that says they don't accept Medicaid patients.

thats very unfortunate, and I agree, its tougher to get things done when you have public vs private insurance

I will say however, that even people with the best insurance are often denied narcotics. Trust me when I saw the DEA monitors EVERY narcotic prescription written, and will beat down your door if you appear to be prescribing too many. It has scared doctors so bad that they are frightened that they will lose their license if they write a script for vicodin

Also, back surgery, even for herniated discs has questionable benefits at best, really no better than physical therapy.

As my post was lost for some reason, I'm just stating: try to get medical help if you can. But also use any possible gentle yoga, tai chi, breathing exercises, drinking enough water, and even taking fish oil supplements to ease pain. Chronic pain causes more inflamation, joint destruction, and many other problems. No matter what the pain clinics say, endometriosis does cause pain: every spot that hurts in the abdomen shows up in surgery as a lesion, internal bleeding, scar, adhesion, or damage to an internal organ. But whether it is a joint problem or endometriosis, if it is a problem that affects women, the DEA will act like they are doctors and not allow the proper treatment. The DEA has not read that pain management will stop joint destruction, and tend to lessen the effects of the hormones in the spread of endometriosis. I wish that the MEN who are the majority in Congress would put a leash on the DEA so that WOMEN could receive proper medical care. This is whether or not WOMEN have medical insurance. Only a few illnesses get pain treatment (illnesses that affect men as well as women).

I feel sorry for you, Tina.

I too suffer from herniated discs (C-spine) and I know the feeling of constant pain. I have private health insurance (through my husband,) but soon (thanks to Chris Christie)our Co-pay will make it impossible for me to affiord any kind of long term treatment for this.

I clean houses part time, and let me tell you it's misery with my neck after doing that for 4 hours a day, knowing I can't afford treatment for it.

My Niece has Medicaid, and was just denied an MRI to rule out a Brain tumor. She's been vomiting and getting headaches for awhile now, and yet Medicaid still denied her the MRI that might save her life.

This world is for the rich, and the rich alone.

I Thank all of you for your concern. It is nice to see some people care. I wasn't taking narcotics for pain though I was getting relief off of tramadol but I am not allowed to have it now. However, this is not the point of the article or why I wrote what I did.

My point is that those of us with any sort of conditions are denied care. And we are made to wait months or reduced to begging just to get our MRI's or other testing. No one here wants to treat people with Medicaid. In fact if we want to see a dentist we have to drive over an hour away to get that care. If we want to be assigned a primary care provider our chances of getting into a local doctor is practically nill....we have to be assigned to a different clinic in the opposite direction of the dental clinic which is of course another hour away. Remember we are on medicaid for a reason but apparently we must have enough funds to get us to these places that are so far away.

My heart goes out to you, Tina ...something very similar happened to a relative several years ago. My advice is to persistently push for surgery sooner rather than later-- my relative was given the run around about surgery for more than a year and was then told that it was too late, she should have had it as soon as the problem started. She was never able to work again.

The world is for the rich, and the rich alone, unfortunately.

My grandson had a severe speech problem when he was 2. He was given speech therapy by Easter Seals (thank God for them), but there was no room anywhere else. My adult daughter is on Medicaid. Meeting other parents of children with speech problems, we found out that none of the children of families on Medicaid had been evaluated for autism, even though they had gone through all the channels at the local hospital, etc. Those with private insurance had been evaluated, and were being treated; and that hospital supposedly takes Medicaid; it also took months for the first appointment, and between appointments, and the appointment secretary wasn't in most of the time. By the way, look into Easter Seals (and folks, contribute to them), and other private organizations and charity hospitals for some help. Don't wait for doctors who just don't have time to treat a child. That therapist from Easter Seals got my grandson to talk, and even be interested in reading by the time he was 3 and 1/2. He is doing very well in school now, but he needed that help early on. His frustration level was so high because he had stopped talking and couldn't help it... and then he couldn't sleep. We also changed his sleeping schedule, and that helped too. But the doctors didn't do much at all; it was the speech therapist who did.

Elizabeth, I'm glad your grandson got help, too. We did all the things we were supposed to do, and we were still backburnered. I think this behavior should rank right up there with child abuse. Denying any child medical services because of monetary gain should not be permitted at any level for any reason.

We've all read where some child has a forced medical intervention because the parents (for whatever reason, usually religious beliefs) won't allow a particular medical treatment. We are on the other end of the stick. We want the medical evaluations and treatments.

Nevertheless, these are issues that should embarass the whole medical establishment. It's time things changed, and if it requires political (heaven help us all) and legal intervention, so be it.

BTW, my grandson is now 10 and doing quite well. He's a bright, wonderful child, and he actually might "out grow" (not the right words, but close) most of his autistic tendencies. He's learned to cope with many of them already, and he knows his limitations. On a whole other subject of autism, I wish his teachers at school were able to understand as much as he does. They are the ones behind on that learning curve.

Why do you feel that doctors should "do more" for lack of better terms, when it was YOUR research and work that got your kids/grandkids the help they needed? I think you proved a point that a lot of people need to understand, you can get a lot more accomplished if you take the time to do the research and work yourself, don't sit back and wait on someone else to do something. Your determination and responsibility gave your family the care they needed. I know it's not a "one solution fits all", but in a LOT of cases, you have the capability to handle a situation if you simply research the problem and do what YOU can to resolve it, before having to rely on a doctor. Part of me believes doctors don't jump to bring in patients because a great deal of the issues can be solved or improved simply by looking on the internet, or reading a book. Both are free at the library if you don't have a computer/internet. Too many people won't do it though.

Please don't take my comment the wrong way, I'm only pointing out the fact that even though it's frustrating you can't get a doctor's help when you want it, you may not need it if you do like you two did, simply become educated about the condition and do what YOU can do to rectify it, rather than sitting back and saying "the doctor won't see me so I guess I'm out of luck".

TM--you are correct to a point. However, medication is needed in many cases, and unfortunately, we can't write the prescription. (We did all the food monitoring, environmental factors, etc. too.) Further, when the children go to school, IEPs, psychologists, special needs, tutoring, speech, physical handicaps, hand flapping, etc. all need to be addressed, and they aren't (in many cases) unless a doctor has intervened. We can only go so far. We did all of the ground work we could, and we did it right. We were very fortunate in that the autism wasn't as severe as it is in many other cases. Denying children the medical intervention they need is plain wrong.

Unfortunately, many other folks aren't as plugged in as we are. They are totally in the dark about what to do. What happens to their children without the necessary (medical) direction they require? I was a foster parent for many years, and some of the children I cared for were severely mentally and medically disabled and on medicaid. Their birth parents were (probably) more handicapped than they were. Where does that leave them, too? We can only do so much.

To be fair, the medical establishment can only do so much, too; but ignoring the problems doesn't make them go away.

The term "entitlement" already brings up a bad image. No healthcare, even in the U.S., is "up to an individual." You cannot get into an insurance plan as an individual, or if you do, you will pay a lot for that insurance. The only way you can possibly afford insurance in the USA is through a group plan, which is not "up to the individual" either for your individual needs or what an individual can pay. Unless you are rich and it doesn't matter, in which case, what pirate business that overcharges their clients do you run, because that is the only way you will have enough to pay for medical care.

But speaking of business... why should business have to pay for healthcare? The businesses are not interested in doing this; it ought to be part of our government... not as "entitlement," but as an incentive to business so that they don't have to pay for the occasional employee who has birth complications or cancer or is hit in a car accident or has a child with a heart murmer...

Liz

I used the word entitlement is the sincere sense, not meant to agitate. I happend to think that all citizens should be entitled to decent healthcare. The devil is in the details.

Primary care doctors who do not treat skin moles that could be cancerous are trying to murder their patients. A primary care doctor will not refer my daughter to a dermatologist. The statute of limitations on murder is never. So, are you one of those doctors who are murdering patients? This is personal; we're talking about my daughter. The rest of the country accepts a much lower salary than any doctor, even after they pay for the new lobby for their practice, their receptionist, computers, other equipment, etc. You cry "wolf" too many times, and add nothing to help solve this problem; but I'm sure that you will try to stop people from getting medical care as best you can. That is where you are putting your faith, hope, and charity: faith and loyalty to those who have money, hope that you can cut somebody out of treatment, and charity towards yourself. The almighty dollar might bully the rest of us, but it won't give you any solace.

Obamacare! You dare to mention that!! According to that bloody thing if I get back on my feet and I do not have health coverage I'll have to pay for it out of my own pocket. Need I remind you that it is actually cheaper for me to pay the doctor out of my own pocket then it is for me to pay for health insurance out of my pocket. And although I am not sure about this final statement of mine - if it has changed or not- but last I knew if I don't pay for health coverage then I'll be fined on top of it! You can shove that Obamacare where the sun doesn't rise!

Tina, the percentage of uninsured that actually PAY their bills.... VERY low. Part of the price you are paying when you see the DR is the cost of your fellow uninsured who DONT pay.

Elizabeth - many primary care docs don't have the expertise to deal with the many skin lesions which present in primary care. There might be an occasional Primary Care doc with some experience in Derm, but they are a rare breed. Most PCPs are, sadly, woefully inadequate to even RECOGNIZE the difference between Basal and Squamous cell cell carcinomas vs. the life threatening malignant melanoma. There are frequent annual and FREE skin cancer screenings available throughout the country. Go to www.AAD.org to find a screening near you. I am not sure what you mean by the inflammatory phrase 'murdering your daughter." Perhaps you could be more specific? The only 'mole' which can threaten life is malignant melanoma. If your daughter has malignant melanoma, NO dermatologist would turn their back to her. Furthermore, ANY cancer center in the world will accept your self-referral. No physician can walk away from that diagnosis since THAT would be malpractice. However, I think there are more details in your case which you are not sharing here, which might shed some light on your daughter's presentation, and it might be helpful to know. I too, have a daughter, so I am not insensitive to your obvious dismay. When you rave and say physicians are trying to murder their patients, you automatically turn off anyone who is trying to help you, because such commentary is patently false. While you are clearly upset, a calm demeanor can work wonders. There may be options out there which you are not aware of. Physicians, even specialists are doctors first and truly want to provide care. It's often a matter of getting IN THE DOOR, which means getting PAST the front desk. I know it sounds crazy - but often when you MEET the specialist (and this might require a fee up front), you can negotiate for fees far, far below what the 'retail' cost would be. Again - it's like when you need any other service - you won't get far by screaming and insulting the very person who can help you. I think there is help available for your daughter and I know that no one is seeking to 'murder' her.