So does anyone on DU know someone who has been able to benefit from the HCR? /nt

2014.

Unless, of course, you are a health insurance company exec - they're being helped a lot.

Sorry, read my other post in this thread.

Or this: http://www.pcip.ca.gov/Home/default.aspx

:thumbsup:

Peersonally, I think it is a crime to charge people for being sick.

This insurance company bailout is a scam. What we NEED is a national single-payer plan that covers everybody, from cradle to grave. Then there wouldn't be any of this PCIP nonsense.

Mandated private insurance. Massive, overlapping bureaucracies meant to keep dozens of insurance companies in business.

That's fucked up.

waiting period?

...and they didn't even know about it but I helped them get PCIP (preexisting condition) insurance.

That was made possible by the Affordable Health Care Act of 2010.

Now she's able to see doctors without paying cash up front or going to ERs (and then being charged hundreds)

Does that count?

http://www.pcip.ca.gov/Home/default.aspx

I have a friend who has had cancer and the only policy she can find that she might be able to afford (until her savings run out) costs $500/month and had a $10,000 deductible.

She lives in Grass Valley.

Funny, because she's a bit of a follower of conspiracy theories, not a fan of Obama.

:hi:

http://www.healthcare.gov/law/provisions/preexisting/index.html

:patriot:

And a couple thousand other corporations who got waivers.

Yep, waivers!

...of kids through their 26th birthday. That's for now -- I have two of them. They've got loans out the wazoo already, and this bridge is most helpful.

There's other stuff phased in later, that could be very important, because of both children's having pre-existing conditions. They might have dodged that particular bullet under the status quo, if they got into a group, but that's unknowable.

I didn't support the bill as a whole but that part did help my family.

...to cover them, or they to cover themselves, under the status quo?

If PPACA hadn't passed, it would not have been replaced by anything better.

she was paying privately (not through an employer) for a catastrophic plan which basically covered nothing except an absolute crisis, and who knows what it would have covered in that case. If she'd been seriously ill, she'd have done like most other people, go bankrupt.

I can get PCIP here in Texas for a good price (relative to the market for non-PEC insurance).

a notice from her insurance company that they would no longer be denying coverage because of pre-existing conditions.

...to thousands of people who didn't have a prayer for getting insurance.

The bill wasn't perfect, just a little of what we need, but the question in the OP asks if anyone has benefited and the answer is clearly, "yes".

Though it seems that not everyone realizes what things became effective sooner than some other things that will, indeed, not be in effect right away.

I'm still paying for coverage, and my understanding is to get on PCIP I have to drop coverage and gamble for 6 months.

You have to have applied, and been turned down, for coverage.

If you currently have coverage the, the logic goes, you don't need coverage.

It's not free health care, it's a guaranty that you won't be turned down-- that's how bad the system was- a company would just turn you down or drop you if you had it.

The fact that you have the coverage you still have might be PCIP working (or else you might have lost it under BushCare).

is inadequate at best

for me. I have a significant, lingering knee injury and I desperately need a second opinion. My new insurance starts this week...maybe I can get another MRI to see what's really wrong in there.

of the other responses here seem to indicate it's already operational? :shrug:

high risk pool in Maryland's MHIP (high risk pool). He was without insurance at all, because he lost his job and went into contracting for his old employer (another case of laying off people and hiring them as contractors in order to cut costs). He couldn't afford the premiums to COBRA his old plan through his former employer at first, so he didn't opt for it. He went without any insurance for over nine months though he has high blood pressure and diabetes. His premiums are somewhere around $700/month for a beefy plan (Carefirst Blue Cross/Blue Shield)that covers just about everything he needs covered. When 2014 comes around, he'll be able to buy into one of the programs in our state's exchange. He will qualify for Medicare in 2015.

When my niece was 2, she was having odd symptoms .. fevers for no reason, sweats, other odd symptoms.

After a wide array of tests, they found that she had a nerve cancer which is over 90% fatal. Part of the reason its 90% fatal is that the majority of your nerves are in your brain, and so usually, this is a brain cancer.

In her case, it was not in her Brain. At this point, I could go into a long story about how the insurance company my sister had at the time tried to deny ANY treatment for this cancer, because the survival rate was under 10%. But the short version is this. The DEATH PANEL had decided. My niece was already DEAD. My sister FOUGHT, found a hospital who would provide treatment, with the understanding that my sister was going to need to find the money later, regardless of the outcome. My sister fought, my niece lived, and my sister went in huge debt. Her insurance company finaly settled for an amount that was far less then they should have paid, but was enough to keep my sister from losing her home.

But after this ... my niece has a "pre-existing condition" ... the cancer. And so, no insurance company would touch her. The BEST my sister could get for her was coverage for basic kid illness and injuries. No coverage for a new cancer, no coverage for any illness that might result from the chemo-treatments. Anything that could be remotely connected to that prior cancer, would not be covered.

Until the reform passed.

My Niece will always have the threat of a recurrence of cancer hanging over her head. But it can't be used to prevent her from getting affordable insurance.

This has been a huge weight lifted off my sister's shoulders.

The insurance companies will not be able to deny her coverage but they can jack the premium price up so high she won't be able to afford it - or they'll offer and "affordable" policy that has copays and deductibles that are so high she won't be able to afford to use it.

The Profit Protection Act only requires that we buy coverage, it does not guarantee access to care.

My sister is now able to include my neice in their family plan for the same price as her son who has no pre-existing condition.

As for being forced to purchase something ... my sister isn't being forced to buy anything, she wants to purchase insurance for her daughter, and now she can.

Oh ... she's also happy that her son who is now 20, will be able to stay on her plan until he's 26, if he hasn't found a position with a better insurance plan.

I actually have a number of friends who have children that fall into the age range where that provision comes into effect.

if you're looking for individual insurance (as your niece may have to do eventually) then she'll have to deal with high premiums and high out of pockets. If your sister is purchasing a family plan on her own, she will see the premiums go through the roof. If the employer's plan winds up with too many people filing too many claims, those premiums will also go up and the employer will probably look at plans with higher out of pockets as a way to limit costs. The law only requires that people with preexisting conditions not be denied coverage - it says nothing about how much the insurance companies can charge for it. Also, with a private plan, it's easier for the insurance crooks to jack up the price when more family members get added even when those additions are healthy.

As I mentioned in another post in this thread, the best a friend who had cancer can find is a policy that costs $500/month and has a $10,000 deductible. She really can't afford the premium and will probably go without insurance.

Minnesota has required children up to age 25 be kept on fully insured plans for several years. My brother had 3 of his children ages 19 & 20 (a set of twins in there) on his group plan. When he was diagnosed with cancer and went on disability he also wound up having to go on COBRA. His share of the premium went from just over $300/month to $1200/month for the COBRA. The COBRA payment for him alone was just under $400. I picked up the payments for him, but I had to throw the kids overboard as I just couldn't do $1,200.

The mandate that we purchase insurance does not kick in until 2014 - but then we will be required to purchase the same old crap from the same old crooks. If you haven't seen "Sicko", I suggest you watch it. If you have seen it, watch it again. It makes it very clear that having insurance does not guarantee access to care and nothing in the insurance scam being billed as "reform" does anything to change that.

to be able to seek out a hospital that would perform the treatment, and enough about the payment and insurance side to challenge the original insurance company.

So, yes..

a co-pay for my semi-annual check-ups. Every little bit helps.

If I take my high deductible policy and seek preventative care I will still be out of pocket for every damn bit of the expense. Such care is still beyond my means. Nothing in that POS legislation is going to change that.

You are ignorant about the legislation.

No, you are ignorant of the legislation.

Those free preventative care services are only available under new insurance plans issued on or after September 23, 2010.

Of course free preventative care isn't worth much if somebody can't afford the medications and treatment required to address disgnosed conditions. It really doesn't matter if you know that you have high blood pressure or diabetes or precancerous skin lesions if you are out of pocket a $10,000 deductible plus a co-pay before you receive any benefit from that insurance policy.

FWIW, I opted to keep my old style high deductible health care policy not get the new one that conforms to the legislation. Why? Because the premium was significantly lower. I doubt I will be able to afford even my high deductile piece of shit policy when it is mandated to conform to the new healthcare legislation.

Subsidies are a great idea. Unfortunately, if you are long-term unemployed and have largely depleted your savings a subsidy ain't worth shit because you still don't have the income to pay the remaining portion of the premium.

There ain't nobody even pretending to do anything to address the fundamental weaknesses in our economy. The dumbshit politicians have to take care of the corporate people first. The flesh and blood people can fend for themselves.

Meaningful heathcare reform was my line in the sand. Obama didn't even fight for it.

Dental Health Services, owned by progressive Democrats, voluntarily expanded all of their policies to included dependent children up to the age of 26 with no increase in premiums.


They did it to show solidarity with the President even though they were not required to.


Thousands of dependent children will be able to get free dental care for an additional 3 years.

http://www.dentalhealthservices.com/

a month or so ago. A fellow passenger kindly said her daughter was picking her up and they would give me a ride to my destination about 30 miles away...

I usually shy away from politics if I want to keep things civil but the daughter brought it up... she has serious health concerns and was gushing about HCR because now she could get coverage for pre-existing conditions.




...of course once I get back to Vermont hopefully I will be ok too...

my 21 year-old son, a part-time college student, was able to be covered by my insurance.He was seen by an orthopedic surgeon and physical therapist ,which would NOT have happened otherwise.

It's expensive, but the premiums just dropped from the original ones set last year --over $100 a month. At my age group and geographic area - age 60 -- it is about $485 a month, and includes certain preventive care and office co-pays that don't come under the deductible. There is an annual out of pocket maximum of about $2,500. There are no annual benefit caps or lifetime caps.

I have some health conditions that I've been needing to see specialists for, but have been delaying even the costly consultations, much less the treatments. Until "Obamacare" -- I didn't have a hope in hell of getting coverage.

over the past two years and I've seen no increase in wages over the past three years.

just a thought at the moment. Next month is renewal, and if there is another double digit % increase, then I have to drop my health insurance.

He's got a 50K debt from a recent battle with kidney stones. I know he's had some other kidney stone episodes as well, I have no idea how much total medical debt he has. He works full time (more than 40hrs per week), but because of his debts he has to live outside the system. He doesn't have credit cards or any bank accounts because he's afraid if he does his money will get taken to pay the debts, so he only uses cash. His savings are in the form of a stack of paychecks that are uncashed so if he gets robbed he doesn't lose everything, he can get the checks reissued. His work cashes them for him when he needs more money.

He's in a failing relationship but he can't leave unless he can save up an entire year's rent to pay in advance because he has no credit.

It's crazy that he's in that situation for a relatively minor illness, not like cancer or heart surgery. Just kidney stones.

I wish I had discovered years earlier that I could use them. They operate on a sliding scale, so at times when my self-employment earnings are particularly dismal, I can take advantage of the sliding scale (note: it's not free), but even at the top of the scale, it's better than paying full price for a private doctor. An especially good point is that things like lab tests are done on a nonprofit basis. For example, I just had a really comprehensive panel of blood tests done a few weeks ago, and it cost $54. I know from previous experience that if those tests were sent out to a private lab, it would have been several hundred dollars. (By the way, this is the North San Diego Health Service.) I'm not sure what other jurisdictions have that is comparable, but it's worth a look.

Obviously, it's not comprehensive -- which is why I want to get the new health insurance -- but it's certainly been a big help for me in recent years. Being without health insurance is a constant worry.

BTW, re prescriptions - you don't need to be a member of Costco to get the benefit of their extremely low prescription prices. You just say "pharmacy" to the person "guarding" the door and then go to the pharmacy section. That has been a lifesaver as well.

RX cost are such they reach what is called the "doughnut hole"...I got a $250 check last year & a 50% off my cost this year which will save me almost $1500!

I also benefited from the drug companies like Pfizer changing the qualifications for people with little income to get medicine free of charge directly from the co. This saves me more than $3200 a year simply by getting one RX from them...This never would have happened had the the drug co. & Obama not made their deal.

And my neighbor still has her son on her insurance & he is in college.

I hope the your question was not just a cynical shot made by someone who really does not understand the HCR law is helping people but rather a serious question by someone who will accept the fact it is helping people.

He is 20, has a mild developmental disability and isn't ready for college yet. Under the old rules, he would be kicked off my family coverage that I pay for via my employer and I would have to buy a separate high deductible, low coverage policy for him which is all I could afford.

He suffers from depression related to his disability and he would no longer have any coverage for treatment of that.

Under the new rules, I get to keep him on my policy and can get him the help and treatment he needs as he struggles to get on his feet.

Obama but liked the fact that his insurance could not use "existing condition" to deny him treatment.

The law will be very good for those willing to buy insurance but turned down because they have some illness such as diabetes. But, w/o the mandate, the insurers will be leery of a law that forces them to accept all comers, when all comers are likely to be folks that need the coverage.

If you look at Medicare figures, the 5% of patients who are most expensive take up 40% of all Medicare spending, and the top 25% take up more than 85% of medicare spending. With fewer people in the "healthy" brackets (and these are the people who are less likely to buy insurance without a mandate), you'll see increased costs for those healthy people that do buy insurance, in order to pay for the people with existing conditions that the insurance companies are forced to accept.

get a job and were just thrilled to stick them onto their insurance. Me? Nothing yet.

We were able to add our 24 YO son to our plan until he got a job and his own insurance. It was a big help.

They have health insurance now and wouldn't have before HCR.

He was able to stay on with his parents' health plan. I think he has another year or two before he cannot be on it.

Gender is no longer a rating criteria for individuals.

My premiums and deductibles have increased by UNPRECEDENTED leaps since the passage of the Health Insurance "reform."

I can't afford to use the insurance that is bankrupting me.

I have gone, and am going, without needed care.

In addition, my son's deductible on the insurance he gets through his employer has increased to $4500 for he and his son. My grandson has a cardiac condition that requires regular monitoring and yearly extensive, and expensive, tests. Right now, my whole family is scraping together what we can to make sure he gets those tests this year, which are due now.

Your son's costs went up $4500... mostly because the higher cost of women's health care is being shifted onto him.

Everyone's costs have gone up, but men far more than women.

The OP asked if they knew anyone who had been helped. Conversely, if we know any men, then we know someone who has been harmed.

My own costs went up enough to ensure that I can't use insurance I pay for.

I'm a woman who could afford to get care before, and now I can't.

high risk plan. This "reform" has done NOTHING for this woman. Joining the state plan would cost me about 75% of my income for the month. Oh yeah, that's helpful. NOT!

This is bullshit still_one and you should know better and if you don't maybe you need to reassess why you're here and then level with the rest of us what that purpose is.+
UNREC

just trying to figure out right now when stuff happens exactly. the preventive care things will be very useful. right now my daughter's bc is covered because it was instituted for other medical issues.
but my insurance is great once you are sick, and suck if you want to stay healthy. seems to be some ins and outs about plan years and grandfathering included in the effective date of this stuff tho. new plans are required to cover it, but existing plans are getting some leeway.

it would have been a great help as far as keeping kids on insurance, except that dingbat blagojevich already passed that as state law in an attempt to cover his ass. i do sort of miss that they used to have to stay in school to stay covered. it was a great weapon. we tried not telling them that they were covered anyway, but some asshole told them.

And I see a lot of republican propaganda inspired bullshit in this thread. For example, blaming ever increasing health insurance premiums, premiums that have been rising way over the official inflation rate for decades, on this law is MASSIVELY DISHONEST.

My adult children are covered - by law - because of this legislation. Nobody can be denied coverage because of a pre-existing condition - by law - because of this legislation. There is plenty to criticize in a bill the locks in the for profit health insurance industry as part of our stupidly expensive health care system, but please be honest in your criticism.

is 25, and will be going to school full time, but I cannot include her in my companies group insurance plan until open enrollment which occurs in November. There is a lot of little fine print like that throughout this HCR package

Even the pre-existing condition, you have to be six months without insurance before you can apply for your states pre-existing insurance pools

Couldn't you have added her last November?

However, there are those who cannot

What I also cannot understand is why someone with pre-existing conditions needs to be uninsured for 6 months before they can get the preexisiting condition coverage

My 21 year old who has a minimum wage job without benefits, is covered under our insurance.

He's a hemophiliac. He's still in school now, and we'll be keeping him on our insurance through college. The extra 4 years will help.

But I have no wondrous thought about him being able to get *affordable* health insurance after that time frame. Keyword being affordable. He had a sprain in PE that rapidly turned into 150 THOUSAND dollars in medication bills, and insurance companies will look at that and stamp his application as a *loser* just because of his pre-existing condition.

I haven't seen much in terms of those pools that were supposed to be happening. Quite frankly I think they won't happen, because the insurance companies are hoping the law get's struck down entirely.

Then my kid will be screwed.

In addition to me? Five that I know of.

It's literally saving them thousands of $$$ and many of them can't find jobs.

Oh you meant personally. Then no. Never mind.