Bush Wants to Cut Entitlements

http://truthout.org/docs_2006/081106O.shtml

I've been seeing articles lately about Bush trying to cut entitlement programs. One said they were trying to cut Medicare (or Medicaid) payments to doctors by 5%.

This seems like political suicide to me - especially now with all the polls showing Bush to be a losing bet.

And if they cut payments to doctors and hospitals won't the end result be that doctors and hospitals will start refusing Medicare patients - I know that it is already difficult for these people to find doctors now.

This is part of their strategy. It is no longer a guaranteed pension plan for every American to prevent extreme poverty among the elderly. They want to frame it as "welfare" for lazy people who don't want to keep working until they drop.

since he came to power. Except, of course when it comes to corporate welfare. (I realize that medicare wasn't part of "The New Deal," but you see what I'm getting at.

They cut medicare reimbursements to doctors by 15%, 5% per year for 3 years.

My doctor is very pissed.

But, I think doctors and lawyers must be the dumbest professions on earth. They keep donating money to Republicans.

The way I see it - that's a pretty strong equivalent to medical care.

the republicans will eventually cut everything until there is nothing left.

The base will not care as they will just go to their churches that the tax payers are beefing up so they will vote for the GOP. Congress is doing nothing to stop it as they also get voters. It is called buying the voters to put in Congressmen that will steal the tax payers money. It is a Catch 22 thing. If this is not true tell me why we do not get a say on that money Bush gives to Churches and why it is not all over the papers? Constitutions said only the House can spend money. Why does Bush have a piggy bank of tax money he can give to churches?

And if they cut payments to doctors and hospitals won't the end result be that doctors and hospitals will start refusing Medicare patients

Many doctors will not take Medicare patients now and I cannot blame them.

Here is a recent billing for myself:

Extremity Study (for bloodclot)-----$351.00
Applied to Deductible-----------------00.00
Medicare Contractual Adjustment---$327.53
Medicare Palmetto GBA Payment-------6.06
Applied to DED/BS---------------------0.00
Secondary Insurance------------------0.00
Billed to Patient---------------------$17.41


Can you tell me what doctor would perform any medical service for $6.06?

I am paying Medicare $88.50 a month for this "non" coverage.

and she said she saw a bill where the patient needed some kind of blood factor. The govt payment to the hospital didn't even cover the factor let alone any of the other hospital costs.

My wife has a solo Family Practice here in Kansas City with about 17% of our patient base on Medicare and Medicaid.

Six months ago when rates were cut YET AGAIN I did an revised analysis of just how much profit we were making for these folks... and discovered that we were actually LOSING 7-14% on each office visit (with overhead).

After that discovery we regretably changed our office policy to not allow any new Medicare/Medicaid patients - with the exception of extended family members of existing patients.

We also "fired" half of the most delinquent Medicare/Medicaid accounts. We have started to fill these "holes" in our schedule with patients with other insurance companies that actually pay their procedures.

We really hated to do this, but we're not a "not for profit" and we have to support our 3 full-time staffers - as well as us!

A side effect of all this happening is that my previous corporate-business-oriented Republican voting wife has had it with all this crap - and is a solid Democrat at this point. Thanks to DU and Bill Maher as well!

I just had to plunk my $0.02 in the jar.

Thanks for reading.

refuse patients for the same reason.