I think the Swiss model could wotk here without the 90-odd percentage of us who are happy with our insurance, having to give up our plans.
I kniow I had occasion to use Hong Kong's medical organization in 2005, I was hospitalized for a week while on vacation. Their hospital was a work in progress,socreature comforts were "austere". Care was first rate and the week cost a bit over $1300 USD.
New Zealand is the pits are far as care for PD goes. There is ONE neurologist with an "interest" in PD, in the north and theyhave an excellent MDS, Barry Snow in the south. IF he choses to see you its up to yuo to pay for a flight to get to Christchurch. Then it is a ONE year wait to see him.
My friend DIAnne has suffered terribly with her PD. She lives in the north.
She has been given every thing but the kitchen sink , to no avail. some of her meds were clearly not compatible with her other meds. She does not have access to competent care.
admittedly she is sensitive to her meds but I can't help but think a good MDS could help her.
Wehave the BEST medical care in the world! We all are at fault for the cost. We have stood idly by while costs went through the roof.
Charlie
--- On Sun, 8/30/09, rayilynlee <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> From: rayilynlee <[log in to unmask]>
> Subject: Healthcare throughout the world
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Date: Sunday, August 30, 2009, 11:53 PM
> Healthcare Facts
>
> By T.R. Reid
>
> Sunday, August 23, 2009
>
> <> As Americans search for the cure to what ails our
> health-care system, we've overlooked an invaluable
> source of ideas and solutions: the rest of<> the
> world. All the other industrialized democracies have faced
> problems like ours, yet they've found ways to cover
> everybody -- and still spend
> far less than we do.
>
> <> I've traveled the world from Oslo to Osaka to see
> how other developed democracies provide health care.
> Instead of dismissing these models as<> "socialist,"
> we could adapt their solutions to fix our problems. To do
> that, we first have to dispel a few myths about health care
> abroad:
>
> 1. It's all socialized medicine out there.
>
> <> Not so. Some countries, such as Britain, New
> Zealand and Cuba, do provide health care in government
> hospitals, with the government paying the bills.<>
> Others -- for instance, Canada and Taiwan -- rely on
> private-sector providers, paid for by government-run
> insurance. But many wealthy<> countries -- including
> Germany, the Netherlands, Japan and Switzerland --
> provide universal coverage using private doctors, private
> hospitals and<> private insurance plans. In some
> ways, health care is less "socialized" overseas than in the
> United <> States. Almost all Americans sign up for
> government insurance (Medicare) at age 65. In Germany,
> Switzerland and the Netherlands, seniors stick with<>
> private insurance plans for life. Meanwhile, the U.S.
> Department of Veterans Affairs is one of the planet's
> purest examples of government-run
> health care.
>
> 2. Overseas, care is rationed through limited choices or
> long lines.
>
> <> Generally, no. Germans can sign up for any of the
> nation's 200 private health insurance plans -- a broader
> choice than any American has. If a<> German doesn't
> like her insurance company, she can switch to another, with
> no increase in premium. The Swiss, too, can choose any
> insurance plan in<> the country.
> In France and Japan, you don't get a choice of insurance
> provider; you have to use the one designated for your
> company or your industry.<> But patients can go to any
> doctor, any hospital, any traditional healer. There no U.S.
> -style limits such as "in-network" lists of doctors or
> <> "pre-authorization" for surgery. You pick any
> doctor, you get treatment -- and insurance has to
> pay.<>Canadians have their choice of providers. In
> Austria and Germany, if a doctor diagnoses a person as
> "stressed," medical insurance pays for weekends at a health
> spa.<>
> <><> As for those notorious waiting lists, some
> countries are indeed plagued by them. Canada makes patients
> wait weeks or months for nonemergency care, as
> a way to keep costs down. But studies by the Commonwealth
> Fund and others report that many nations -- Germany,
> Britain, Austria -- outperform the<> United States on
> measures such as waiting times for appointments and for
> elective surgeries. In Japan, waiting times
> are so short that most patients don't bother to make an
> appointment. One Thursday morning in Tokyo, I called
> the<> prestigious orthopedic clinic at Keio University
> Hospital to schedule a consultation about my aching
> shoulder. "Why don't you just drop by?" the receptionist
> said. That same afternoon, I was in the surgeon's office.
> Dr. Nakamichi<> recommended an operation. "When
> could we do it?" I asked. The doctor checked his computer
> and said, "Tomorrow would be pretty difficult.
> Perhaps some day next week?"
>
> 3. Foreign health-care systems are inefficient, bloated
> bureaucracies.
>
> <>Much less so than here. It may seem to Americans
> that U.S.-style free enterprise -- private-sector,
> for-profit health insurance -- is naturally<> the most
> cost-effective way to pay for health care. But in fact, all
> the other payment systems are more efficient than
> ours. <>U.S. health insurance companies have the
> highest administrative costs in the world; they spend
> roughly 20 cents of every dollar for
> nonmedical<>costs, such as paperwork, reviewing claims
> and marketing. France's health insurance industry, in
> contrast, covers everybody and spends about 4<>
> percent on administration. Canada's universal insurance
> system, run by government bureaucrats, spends 6 percent on
> administration. In Taiwan, a<> leaner version of the
> Canadian model has administrative costs of 1.5
> percent; one year, this figure ballooned to 2 percent, and
> the opposition <>parties savaged the government
> for wasting money. The world champion at controlling
> medical costs is Japan, even though its <>aging
> population is a profligate consumer of medical care. On
> average, the Japanese go to the doctor 15 times a
> year, three times the U.S. rate. They<> have twice as
> many MRI scans and X-rays. Quality is high; life expectancy
> and recovery rates for major diseases are better than in the
> United<> States. And yet Japan spends about $3,400 per
> person annually on health care; the United States
> spends more than $7,000.
>
> 4. Cost controls stifle innovation.
>
> <>False. The United States is home to groundbreaking
> medical research, but so are other countries with much lower
> cost structures. Any American who's<> had a hip or
> knee replacement is standing on French innovation.
> Deep-brain stimulation to treat depression is a Canadian
> breakthrough. Many of the<> wonder drugs promoted
> endlessly on American television, including Viagra, come
> from British, Swiss or Japanese labs.<> Overseas,
> strict cost controls actually drive innovation. In the
> United States, an MRI scan of the neck region costs
> about $1,500. In Japan, the<> identical scan costs
> $98. Under the pressure of cost controls, Japanese
> researchers found ways to perform the same diagnostic
> technique for
> one-fifteenth the American price. (And Japanese labs still
> make a profit.)
>
> 5. Health insurance has to be cruel.
>
> <> Not really. American health insurance companies
> routinely reject applicants with a "preexisting condition"
> -- precisely the people most<> likely to need the
> insurers' service. They employ armies of adjusters to deny
> claims. If a customer is hit by a truck and faces big
> medical bills, the insurer's "rescission department" digs
> through the records looking for<> grounds to cancel
> the policy, often while the victim is still in the hospital.
> The companies say they have to do this stuff to survive in a
> tough business. Foreign health insurance companies, in
> contrast, must accept all<> applicants, and they can't
> cancel as long as you pay your premiums. The plans are
> required to pay any claim submitted by a doctor or hospital
> (or health spa), usually within tight time limits. The big
> Swiss insurer<> Groupe Mutuel promises to pay all
> claims within five days. "Our customers love it," the
> group's chief executive told me. The corollary is that
> everyone is mandated to buy insurance, to give the plans an
> adequate pool of rate-payers.<> The key difference is
> that foreign health insurance plans exist only to pay
> people's medical bills, not to make a profit. The United
> States is the only developed country that lets insurance
> companies profit from basic health coverage.<> In many
> ways, foreign health-care models are not really "foreign"
> to America, because our crazy-quilt health-care system
> uses elements of all of them. For Native Americans or
> veterans, we're Britain: The government<> provides
> health care, funding it through general taxes, and patients
> get no bills. For people who get insurance through their
> jobs, we're Germany:<> Premiums are split between
> workers and employers, and private insurance plans pay
> private doctors and hospitals. For people over 65, we're
> Canada:<> Everyone pays premiums for an insurance plan
> run by the government, and the public plan pays private
> doctors and hospitals according to a set fee<>
> schedule. And for the tens of millions without insurance
> coverage, we're Burundi or Burma: In the world's poor
> nations, sick people pay out of
> pocket for medical care; those who can't pay stay sick or
> die.
>
> <> This fragmentation is another reason that we spend
> more than anybody else and still leave millions without
> coverage. All the other developed<> countries have
> settled on one model for health-care delivery and finance;
> we've blended them all into a costly, confusing bureaucratic
> mess.<> Which, in turn, punctures the most persistent
> myth of all: that America has "the finest health care" in
> the world. We don't. In terms of results,<> almost all
> advanced countries have better national health statistics
> than the United States does. In terms of finance, we force
> 700,000 Americans<> into bankruptcy each year because
> of medical bills. In France, the number of medical
> bankruptcies is zero. Britain: zero. Japan: zero. Germany:
> zero.
>
> <>Given our remarkable medical assets -- the
> best-educated doctors and nurses, the most advanced
> hospitals, world-class research -- the United<> States
> could be, and should be, the best in the world. To get
> there, though, we have to be willing to learn some lessons
> about health-care administration from the other
> industrialized democracies.
>
> > T.R. Reid, a former Washington Post reporter, is the
> author of "The
>
> > Healing of America: A Global Quest for Better,
> Cheaper, and Fairer Health
>
> > Care," to be published Monday.
>
>
> Rayilyn Brown
> Director AZNPF
> Arizona Chapter National Parkinson Foundation
> [log in to unmask]
>
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