In her latest installment, Kliff digs deep into the famously bizarre
world of ER bills and points out some of the most egregious ways in
which these are rigged.
For example, if you are injured and also financially precarious, you
might travel to a more distant ER just to be sure that the hospital
you’re visiting is in-network for your insurer, but that means nothing.
“In-network” ERs often staff “out-of-network” doctors, and there is no
way to find out whether the doctor treating you is covered by your
insurer until you get the bill: one of Kliff’s readers got bills for
$8,000 from an out-of-network surgeon who treated his broken jaw at an
in-network hospital.
And much of the care you receive at an ER is subject to bizarre price
gouging: one of Kliff’s readers was charged $238 for two drops of the
generic eyedrop ofloxacin which retails for $15/vial; the routine
pregnancy test that ERs administer to women of childbearing years can
cost up to $465, enough to buy 84 pregnancy kits at the pharmacy; and
one Seattle hospital charged $76 for a squirt of generic neosporin. Not
all hospitals gouge on all drugs, and many of these drugs are not being
administered for urgent health problems – a halfway honest hospital
could advise a patient, “We charge $238 for this eyedrop, why don’t you
pick up a bottle for $15 next door and administer it yourself?”
Finally, Kliff uncovers wild variability in the “ER facility fee,” which
is a cover-charge you’re assessed just for walking in the door at an
ER. One of Kliff’s readers paid $5,751 for sitting in a hospital waiting
room with an ice-pack and a bandage while waiting to see a doctor, but
who left because she was feeling better and didn’t need care after all.
Kliff’s work reveals that these “facility fees” are rising at twice the
rate of other health charges, with no rhyme or reason.
All of this refers to people who come into the ER under their own power,
out of an abundance of caution – for example, my daughter recently
broke her collarbone, but we didn’t know that until we went to the ER
for an X-ray, and if we’d less prudent, we could have iced it and made a
regular doctor’s appointment for the next day, leaving her untreated
and undiagnosed. But of course, ERs treat large numbers of people who
are unconscious or in agony when they arrive, either on their own or on
an ambulance gurney. These patients can’t possibly be expected to shop
around, to demand to know whether their medicines are medically
necessary (I once had a small eye injury that I went to get checked out
on a Sunday just in case and had to stop the nurses from pumping me full
of IV dramamine just in case it turned out I would need neurosurgery!),
to evaluate whether the doctors are in- or out-of-network, and so on.
(We ended up paying $2,400 out of pocket for our daughter’s ER visit,
including $2.50 for a generic tylenol, despite having gold-plated
insurance from Cigna)
Kliff’s work reveals the whole story of “market based medicine” to be a
fiction. Markets are regulated zones where consumers compare the
offerings of producers and make purchase choices based on their
information. To call being wheeled unconscious into an ER and raced into
an operating theater and then presented with a bill months later a
“market transaction” is to make a terribly, grisly joke.
It’s as good an argument for Medicare for All and single-payer health care as you could ask for.
hey if you do shit like this i want you to fucking unfollow me right now, invisible disabilities exist and the people with them need accommodations like disabled parking
If you want to help disabled people, but refuse to acknowledge invisible illnesses exist/ demand proof of an illness, you’re not really for disabled people
Do not even speak to me if you do this. You have no idea who is and isn’t disabled. Placard up? Then theyre legal to be there. I just went through two years of trying to get the damn thing and I am gonna USE IT.
I know I don’t “””look””” multiply disabled. That’s not your call to make. I will definitely lose my attempt at charitable and zenlike calm if I EVER catch you doing this sh*t. I am still fully capable of ‘taking you to the cleaners’ as it were. I will collapse afterward, because Severe ME/CFS, but I WILL STILL DO IT.
Ppl be like “ I want an actual male gem, not just Steven.”
Jeez, it’s like having only one character
to represent your whole gender
in a group composed all of another gender
is a bit upsetting huh?
I wonder
what
that’s like
no really
can you
even imagine
what this lack of representation
MUST
FEEL
LIKE
This
post
isn’t
long
enough
none of the listed shows are named after the one female character, either
it’s actually physically impossible for me to not reblog this post.
I want to say I’ve reblogged this before, but I’m reblogging again for the brilliant addition of, “None of the listed shows are named after the one female character, either” because FUCKING THANK YOU.
mmmmmhm.
Every time I reblog this, there are new shows on the list.
Wow
it’s almost
as though
this happens
almost constantly
But normally you don’t notice, because it’s not about you.
Is anybody else bitter that their disability went undiagnosed their entire youth and was treated like a behavioral/personality flaw because they got good grades?
Professors should not be allowed to ban laptops in class. Professors should not be allowed to ban recorders in class. Professors should not be able to ban students from taking pictures of the whiteboard at the end of lectures. Professors should not be allowed to ban ANYTHING that will make the class more accessible for ALL students. I don’t care what the excuse is.
“They might not even be taking notes on their laptop, they’re probably playing games!” So that’s on the student and they’ll have to live with those grades. They’re paying thousands of dollars to be there, if they want to fuck off and waste their money that’s on them.
“I’m uncomfortable with my lectures being recorded!” What EXACTLY are you saying in your lectures that makes you worried about being recorded, hmm?
“I just don’t like the idea of being on camera/recorded at work. How would YOU feel being recorded at work?” Buddy, I work in retail. I’m always being watched. Suck it the fuck up.
And before anyone says “but you can just bypass this by getting permission from accessibility services!” 1. Not all students with disabilities have up-to-date diagnosis to qualify, 2. Not all students with disabilities have had it confirmed by a professional yet and won’t be able to access those services, 3. Not all students who need these accommodations even have a disability! Some people just learn differently and lecture-style learning actually doesn’t work for a lot of people! and 4. This often puts a student on the spot to all their classmates and can make them feel very uncomfortable.
Students should not have to jump through hoops to get an education that they’re paying for. That’s not accessibility.
Students, however, who ARE just playing games on their laptops instead of taking notes, should have the courtesy to NOT SIT ANYWHERE BUT THE BACK ROW.
Because I am HAPPY to make things accessible for you. I will record my own lectures (so the online-only students can listen to the MP3s on their commute, too). The PDFs are on the class website. A copy of the textbook is ON RESERVE at the library, so you can do the readings EVEN WHEN YOUR CAR IS BROKEN INTO. I’ll give your ASL interpreter a copy of the notes so she can sit facing you, and I will harass the publisher until they get off their asses and FedEx a Braille textbook to me to give you.
But everyone else in that class is jumping through hoops, too. And you do NOT get to make it harder for other students to concentrate.
Which those blinking, MOVING games will do. Motion draws the eye.
Why else do you think I roam the classroom while I teach?
It’s not just so I can see IF you’re playing games and NOT sitting in the back.
It’s so I can keeep everyone else’s attention, too.
And rest assured, I will pull out my ‘Captain America is VERY disappointed in you’ face if I roam, and see you gaming (in a front row).
I’ll also happily stand RIGHT NEXT TO YOU until you start making it harder for everyone else to learn.
Game all you want.
Just don’t distract ANYONE ELSE.
Okay, reblogging again for only small thing.
About the professors feeling uncomfortable being recorded. Look. I’m a teacher myself – although I’m not exercising my profession yet – in a country where the fucking PRESIDENT told kids to record their teachers and SEND HIM the videos if they thought it was a SUBVERSIVE CLASS.
Yeah, i agree that you should let people watch your class however is better to them, but if you are in a complicated political climate, record your class yourself. Talk with all your students if possible, try and see who of them would have the class experience improved by it and then give it directly to them.
Praise for accessibility. But do not put yourself in risk.
All very true.
And to add: I’m one of those folks who takes notes better on a laptop. When I took History of Witchcraft (a bomb fucking class, by the way, should be required for women’s studies majors), THE PROF ACTUALLY USED MY NOTES TO HELP COMPOSE THE FINAL.
Why?
Because I can take dictation at 92 WPM unassisted, and with OpenOffice’s autocomplete and a custom complete list, I was able to bump that to 132 WPM.
In other words: she accepted my request to take notes via laptop, and in return she damn near got transcripts of her lessons, color-coded and everything. Which she, in turn, used to assist other students, because sometimes lessons go in directions you didn’t expect because of questions, or because your students may have put the emPHAsis on the wrong sylLAble in their notes and it tells you that you need to clarify your key points.
Accommodating my disability helped THE ENTIRE CLASS. Being open to diverse learning styles created a better class FOR EVERYONE, including the professor.
…..also, she did stop class one time over my laptop. She walked behind me, looked at my screen, and I heard her just….slowly stop…..and then she looked closer over my shoulder, obviously reading the text, and there was this pause, and then she picked back up. I don’t think she believed I could possibly actually be typing that fast until she saw it with her own eyes.
