Medicare not paying for doctor's errors

Sarita- they talk about cath issues too!!!

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/23224183/wid/11915773/

 

Fitzy-It's nice to know insurance companies are doing SOMETHING positive for the patient. I think they should have rejected payment to my hospital for the last week of my stay during my resection.
Because I contracted a lovely staff infection while I was there trying with every ounce of immune strength I had left to survive! I also think the insurance companies should refuse to pay for wrong diagnosis in the ER! Such as my recent gall bladder duct blockage caused by a stone. The only thing they could find on my CT scan (which was run without dye) was an ovarian cyst. Hmmmm, how is it I had severe pain under my rib cage and vomiting and no lower quadrant pain? Also, why did they immediately dose me full of morphine and then ask me if I felt any pain just prior to release from the ER! MAJOR DUH! I would have ripped someones head off over your cath issues! Sorry to sound violent, but sometimes the squeaky wheel gets the oil!

As an RN, I have always felt that a person should be on an antibiotic for 2 days after a catheter, just for precaution. I can't tell you how many folks I saw in the ER following hospitalization with a UTI post cath.

Tingle, I bet in many ways that would be a good idea...I myself got a 3-day course of Cipro the day after I was released from the hospital because I figured the blatantly miscalculated insertion of my Foley would result in a UTI. Although I am always an alarmist about antibiotic resistance so avoid the anti-b's whenever possible...

It'll be a long process to eliminate needless catheterizations...starting with the hospital administrators and proceeding onto the chief of medicine, the attendings, the residents, the interns, the nurses, the LPNs, the medical assistants...but heck, that alone would save billions of dollars for the healthcare industry. A little prevention goes a long way.

Thanks for posting the link, Fitz.

Well...I work in the reinsurance industry and I rate based on experience. This should help some of the Medicare plans I see save experience costs and therefore save on reinsurance costs. the health plans can then help pass on this savings to their members. It's funny, but people are finally starting to see that facilities are part of the big costs they pay not just the insurance comapnies.
Remember insurance consumers....check your bills from hospitals and doctors just like you look at your charge card bills. Humans generate the bills and people in charge of profits determine costs. You can find errors and misbillings and report them to your insurance company. Some insurance plans even reward members for finding errors that save the insurance company money. If you feel something was misbilled or there was a complication that you feel should be the hospitals cost, use your insurance comapny as a partner to avoid the billing even if you are not on Medicare. Yes, the facility may pass this on to other consumers, but the process has to start somewhere.