Monday, July 23, 2007

HMO FOR PRISONERS


















"Our costs can come down," said Patricia Caruso, director of the Michigan Department of Corrections.

In the words of Michael Moore: "Sicko!"

Visit Red Tape Blog for the latest news on the Michigan prison system.

5 comments:

the walking man said...

"See nothing up my sleeves"

Danny Tagalog said...

Hmmm. Who is she representing? I bet she doesn't say that...

The Birdman of Alcatraz said...

Take two aspirin and see me in the morning.

ivan@creativewriting.ca said...

Took me a while, as a Canadian to translate HMO to hospital.

I was just thinking of the way of all prisoners.

HMO for prisoners:

I'se your new room mate.

Ivan

the walking man said...

Ivan HMO= Health Maintenance Organization

You pick a primary care physician and that physician is supposed to see to you over all health needs and if a specialist is called for the PCP has to refer you to one within the network.

At first they worked out ok and there was little out of pocket expense to them but now for example I take 9 prescriptions...two years ago i was paying 22$ for me and my wife now it's 145.00$ per month.

But whether you are seen by your PCP or not they still get a check from the HMO because you are their patient and the less they see of you and the more patients they have the bigger th check is every month.

An HMO patients time with the Dr. is usually no more than 15 minutes and then they go running off to the next one all throughout the day and if they recommend less expensive tests as opposed to more comprehensive work ups...the bigger the kick back.

This is now the primary American model for those fortunate enough to have health care at all, which is 4/5ths of the population including those with gov't sponsored Medicare (disabled and retired) and poor w/ kids) Medicaid.

Leaving 50,000,000 americans with no health insurance at all in any form.