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posted by
martyb
on Friday April 19 2019, @08:11PM
from the Death-is-cheap-life-is-expensive-dept dept.
from the Death-is-cheap-life-is-expensive-dept dept.
Have you ever wondered what it costs to keep a person alive when they are on the brink of death? Thanks to a post by a suicide survivor who started a rash of posts concerning hospital costs for the mortally challenged we know that the hospital bill for suicide management can be from 10K to 100K. Oliver Jordan clocked up 25,000 likes and hundreds of responses to his post with some people saying it cost them 10K to 20K for a US emergency room visit. Once a patient enters a hospital they can racked many charges often without realising what the end bill will be.
In memory of MDC.
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'This is how expensive it is to attempt suicide': Patient’s bill goes viral
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sillema sillema nika su
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday April 19 2019, @08:34PM (16 children)
Had an ultrasound. Standard Price $5800.
'negotiated' price with provider adjustment: final price: $151
They just make these 'charges' up..
Hospital "corporations" ought to be illegal..
This country sucks...
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Friday April 19 2019, @08:50PM (6 children)
Even including the liquid helium expenses, they are only a couple grand in the 2nd-3rd world, as opposed to the 10-50k they are here. And the turnaround is generally much faster too, since they are running them constantly rather than with a lot of idle time like here in the states.
(Score: 4, Informative) by pTamok on Friday April 19 2019, @09:01PM (4 children)
Cost of Private (i.e. not subsidised by the state) MRI scans in the UK.
https://www.privatehealth.co.uk/conditions-and-treatments/mri-scan/costs/ [privatehealth.co.uk]
(Score: 2) by captain normal on Friday April 19 2019, @10:00PM (2 children)
MRI imaging is a different critter than ultrasound .
Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not to his own facts"- --Daniel Patrick Moynihan--
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday April 19 2019, @10:05PM
Not more expensive though is it?
(Score: 1, Informative) by pTamok on Friday April 19 2019, @10:21PM
Cost of Private (i.e. not subsidised by the state) ultrasound scans in the UK.
https://www.privatehealth.co.uk/conditions-and-treatments/ultrasound/costs/ [privatehealth.co.uk]
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Friday April 19 2019, @10:09PM
I knew it! UK is in the 2nd-3rd world. (large grin)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by bzipitidoo on Saturday April 20 2019, @04:22AM
For a CT scan the hospital list price: $9107. Medicare price: $189.
For a 1L bag of saline solution the hospital charges $306, and Medicare charges a bit less than $2.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday April 19 2019, @09:38PM (4 children)
You can group with a large group of potential users and buy the damn machine.
(Score: 2) by NewNic on Friday April 19 2019, @09:52PM
Unless you pay off the local doctors, you won't get any referrals.
lib·er·tar·i·an·ism ˌlibərˈterēənizəm/ noun: Magical thinking that useful idiots mistake for serious political theory
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Friday April 19 2019, @10:12PM (1 child)
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday April 19 2019, @11:01PM
Or someone who knows what they're doing. Certification cuts out the competition.
(Score: 1) by Ethanol-fueled on Saturday April 20 2019, @02:25AM
We already bought it. It's called the American Medical Establishment. People from the Baby-Boomer generation, ancestry disregarded and many of them in congress, realized that by focusing and legislating the anger of younger disenfranchised generations away into hatred for another scapegoat, could continue to live in fat city at the expense of everybody else by drawing the fire and using their command of the media apparatus as their "bazooka."
It's a technique used by Hitler and many others over the course of time.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by edIII on Friday April 19 2019, @09:43PM (1 child)
The other side of that coin is when they're not making the charges up......
Those costs are approximate, but I read that in an article detailing why insurance costs for medical malpractice increases the costs of most regular products by several thousand percent. It's how a single band-aid can be $15.
This is why medical in general needs to be practiced differently and more like Starfleet Medical. Disallow ALL lawsuits of any kind against the medical providers, and move towards a justice based approach. Meaning, if the medical community reviews the doctor's actions and determines he was a bad doctor, then remove him from his position. Have him undergo more training and certification before being allowed to touch somebody again. The victim does need to go for a $250 million dollar penalty because medical is already free. Any compensation would clearly include healing them of the damage, and continuing to provide the healthcare regardless. In other words, the citizen is already protected the social safety nets and does need to go for punitive damages. If the doctor fucked up too badly, then criminal charges should also be on the table, providing actual justice. If the doctor is convicted of that crime, then, and only then, can the victim start their own civil lawsuit, and can only name the doctor directly. This would preclude billions of dollars annually in costs, if not more.
In the US, maybe upwards of 40c on the dollar is spent on you. The fact of the matter is that medicine could be practiced with a fraction of the budget achieving greater results. Proof of that can be found just be looking at Cuban health care. Double sanctions for over 60 years, and they're leaders in the medical community widely recognized as providing quite excellent medical care under their conditions. They're even capable of saving a diabetic's foot whereas the US just cuts it off.
American health care costs are not stupid. They're based in cruelty and greed in a system not designed to provide medical care. It's entirely for profit with a sister market called Big Pharma that is dangerously for profit and entirely willing to risk thousands of deaths as a mere statistic to achieve ever greater profits. The Sacklers are a cancer on our society, and just one small corrupt evil cog in the meat grinder that is the American Dream™.
Technically, lunchtime is at any moment. It's just a wave function.
(Score: 2) by linkdude64 on Saturday April 20 2019, @02:29AM
No more points can be given, but this brought up many interesting points.
(Score: 2) by hendrikboom on Saturday April 20 2019, @02:31AM
Last private MRI I had here in Montreal was $550.
(Score: 2) by darkfeline on Saturday April 20 2019, @04:06AM
Even better, there's an entire industry around making these charges up. Figuring out the right billing codes to use is an entire job, hospitals hire people whose entire job is figuring out the right charges to make up.
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