Reasons For The High Cost Of Healthcare: Money, And The Big Business Of Being Born

PoliTalker said:
Hello Celticguy,



Midwives specialize in water-births. There are two reasons most women never consider a Midwife assisted natural birth option. First, they are unaware that is even an option. ACOG has made sure that OB-GYN offices do NOT have this information available. They just act like there is only one option, that being the hospital birth.



And if they were armed with all the information they would want what is done in the majority if industrialized nations which have a better outcome than the USA.



It takes 20 minutes to prep the OR for a C-Section. Any location within 20 minutes is just as safe as being in the hospital. Midwife makes the call, OR prep is begun. Mother is transferred to the OR before the OR is even ready. That's how they do it where the outcomes are better.
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It took zero minutes to prep the one we had because it was dedicated to birthing, not a general OR.
As I pointed out earlier you have obviously never been to a hospital maternity ward. Ours was great and this was 25, year's ago.
Know why?
It's likely the first hospitalization a young family will experience. You only get one chance to make a first impression. So where will they be likely to go should they need hospital care?
You feel free to roll the dice if you like.
 
Hello Celticguy,

Celticguy said:
It took zero minutes to prep the one we had because it was dedicated to birthing, not a general OR.
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I doubt that. The team has to be assembled. People have to gown up. Instruments have to be gotten out.

Celticguy said:
IAs I pointed out earlier you have obviously never been to a hospital maternity ward.
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You pointed out nothing. What you did was make a completely unsubstantiated claim which you have no way of backing up.

Celticguy said:
Ours was great and this was 25, year's ago.
Know why?
It's likely the first hospitalization a young family will experience. You only get one chance to make a first impression.
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And sometimes first impressions are not very representative at all.

Celticguy said:
So where will they be likely to go should they need hospital care?
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To a hospital, of course. That also happens to be the most expensive option, and since most people are conditioned to assume that is the only viable option then that is one of the reasons American health care costs double what it does in other countries which have a better outcome.

Celticguy said:
You feel free to roll the dice if you like.
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Actually, since Midwifery has a better record than OB you are taking a greater chance by going to the hospital as a first choice.
 
We could save money and lives by taking a fresh look at how we do birth.

Medical doctors used to X-Ray pregnant women until they figured out it was causing birth defects.

This proves they don't always know what they are doing. It proves they can be wrong and harmful.

Don't just trust them to always have the right answer.

They are human. They make mistakes.

They think they are doing the right thing. They will tell you they know what they are doing. That is exactly the way they acted back when they were causing birth defects with X-Rays.

How can they be so sure they are right when they have been wrong before?

Why don't we look at how other industrialized nations are getting fewer deaths at or around the time of birth?

Why do we accept our sub standard record and think we are the best when we clearly are not?

Sometimes it is good to question established things.

Such as thinking the costly hospital is the best place for a low-risk birth when it clearly is NOT.
 
Robo said:
Every added cost I've even noticed to America's healthcare came right along with the fucking federal government's meddling in it!
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What you notice is not real. The fact that the medical profession sets their own prices is just a guarantee of higher and higher prices. Insurance companies whose theme is to fight providing the healthcare you pay for is another huge cost. Insurance has no product. They are not in the business of providing care. They are just gateway keepers deciding what care you should be allowed to have. They overrule doctors and deny treatments.
Our system is fucked. When you get Medicare you will see what real healthcare is like. They send emails telling you what preventative procedures you qualify for. It changes as you age. They are doing preventative medicine since the earlier you get sick, the more it costs them. You get a yearly physical too.
 
ACOG is the lobbying arm of birth doctors. They have pressured State legislatures all over the nation to make it as difficult as possible to practice Midwifery. Natural birth services are almost nonexistent in some states as a result. Other States cling to service by a thread. ACOG has advanced so many restrictions on being a Midwife, that many Midwives are priced out of their profession due to crushing fees and requirements.

Who even knows mothers have the option of not using the hospital for birth?

Well, nobody who listens to ACOG doctors, that's for sure.
 
Part of our national problem was that unions fought to get healthcare for the workers. Most Dem presidents, even before FDR wanted to get a single-payer system in effect. They knew that America not having a national healthcare system was a mistake. But America has always been run by the wealthy. They think denying peace of mind to all citizens will cost money that they could pocket.
So we had nothing. Unions fought to get healthcare in their contracts. Once they succeeded, other companies had to do the same to draw workers. So health coverage fell on companies across the nation.
This is a terrible system. Companies competing globally have to do so with the cost and maintenance of healthcare costs on their books. It is just a bad system that cannot be defended.
 
PoliTalker said:
Dr. Marsden Wagner was the former Director Of Women's and Children's Health for the World Health Organization.

He wrote an eye-opening book which explains a significant part of why health care costs so much in America. The reason: Medical interventionism with birth care.

His book, Born in the USA: How a Broken Maternity System Must Be Fixed to Put Women and Children First First
is a no-holds-barred critical review of how we do birth in the USA, what the problems are, why they hurt us, and how we could do much better.

He doesn't even go into the fact that the for-profit birth industry in the USA is costing us huge amounts of money and the costs are spread out to everybody, not just mothers, because of our for-profit insurance industry. That's why we should all care about this subject, whether we know somebody who is pregnant/trying; or not.

His focus is mostly on the mothers and babies, and how we are not treating them as well as we could.

Here's the problem. ACOG, the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, the very powerful lobbying arm of OB-GYNs, sees midwifery as competition, and has quite successfully suppressed America from even considering a completely natural birth.

Most people think when you're pregnant you have to go to the hospital. This is not true. Pregnant women are pregnant; not sick. The hospital is a place that sick and injured people go for treatment. It is not really the best place to have a baby. It's too expensive, and they have a tendency to use unnecessary medical interventions to induce birth and hurry it along mass production style. Get 'em in and get 'em out and keep that hospital bed turnover rate high for the highest profits.

This does not always produce the best outcome. It is the highest cost method to have a birth, and it is usually not necessary. Most women don't realize they have other options because OB-GYNs won't tell them, and they acquire women as patients long before they get pregnant. So when women do get pregnant, they are already on a track to the highest cost birth experience but not always the safest.

We should use Midwives as the primary provider for birth care in the 70-80% of low-risk pregnancies, and rely on OB-GYNs (high paid surgeons) for the 20-30% of high risk cases and in case of complications. Midwifery Birth Centers should be located in or near hospitals. Being nearby (within 20 minutes) is just as safe as being in the hospital because it takes 20 minutes to prep an OR in the case of a needed emergency C-Section.

Midwives are trained in natural childbirth and know when there is a problem. Amazingly, OB-GYNs are NOT trained in natural childbirth. They are trained in medical intervention birth. The first thing they are going to do is hook up the pregnant woman to a bunch of probes and monitors, and have her stuck in bed in one position. Midwives can and will encourage the woman to get up and walk around naturally as needed and continue having a comfortable life until the moment is at hand. And they are trained to wait for the baby to come naturally, something high dollar surgeons and for-profit hospitals don't always have time for.

But because of ACOG, Midwifery has been made out to be 'unconventional,' and it is shunned by the very people birthing-age women go to for advice. This is wrong, and it costs us all lots of money. A powerful big money industry has been built on this ruse.


The Business Of Being Born
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As with everything else....Big Government creates a problem then professes to be the answer to the problem they created. Big Brother through corrupt politicians and lobby kickbacks created this health care nightmare. Before Big Brother began taking care of our health needs.....a physicians visit cost around 15-20 bucks, today that same visit will cost upwards of 200 bucks because the patients do not have to directly pay for the visit....and the INDUSTRY socks it to the insurance companies, Medicare and Medicaid (the idiots don't realize...nothing is free, its the TAX PAYER...i.e., the middle class that pays for all the socialist FREE SHIT).

As Mr. Reagan said, "The most terrifying words in the English language are......I am from the government and I am here to help." :bigthink:

I am all for UNIVERSAL single payer insurance. Every citizen of the US should have a universal coverage for Catastrophic Health....everything else, to include day to day injuries and illnesses should come directly out of the pocket of the Patient. Catastrophic Health Care Insurance can be provided for pennies on the dollar compared to 80/90/or 100% coverage that is nothing but a blank check to any health care provider. You go in with a common cold, and they have been sued so much....they run every test under the sun to CYA (cover your own ass)...at a cost to the taxpayer in the 1000s instead of the 10s of dollars. That's why a hospital can charge you 20 bucks a pop for over the counter aspirin....and 700 dollars a night for a cot to sleep on when you can rent the highest priced hotel room for half that cost.
 
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Part of the problem is that many insurance policies do not cover the cost of a natural Midwife-assisted birth.

And that is strange, because you would think insurance companies would be all over using a service that costs around half of what they have been paying and yields better results with fewer lost babies and fewer lost mothers. Midwives are adept at spotting problems, and the standard protocol is to transfer to the hospital when it becomes apparent there is a complication. Since Midwives handle the low-risk pregnancies only, there are few transfers. Most of Midwife assisted births come out just fine, so they rarely get sued. This means their malpractice insurance is far lower than for a Doctor. This is also another reason their fees are so much lower.

So it is perplexing why insurance companies do not utilize this option and make sure their customers know what their options are. Pregnant mothers are evaluated as early in pregnancy as possible to see if they are low-risk and able to have a natural childbirth. Many parameters are examined in making this determination. If their pregnancy is high risk, Midwives do not accept them as clients. (They are not called 'patients' because they are not sick. They are PREGNANT.) Midwives also monitor progress throughout the pregnancy and utilize the results of lab testing. If the risk factor changes from low-risk to high, the client is transferred to a Doctor at that time. The focus is on having a good outcome.

There is a very organized coordination between Midwives and Doctors in the other industrialized countries which use Midwives for 70% of their births, and have better outcomes. Each professional concentrates on their field of expertise. Relationships are well established for making sure mothers get the proper care, and transfers are handled smoothly and routinely.

In America, most birth Doctors are very disparaging of Midwives, treating them as quacks, claiming they are 'practicing medicine without a license.' There is a strong resistance. Big money powerful ACOG has lobbied for and made many laws requiring Midwives to have an on-call Doctor ready to accept high-risk transfers, but most ACOG member Doctors refuse to establish such relationships or arrangements, leaving many Midwives trained and ready, but unable to practice their profession, hampered by a steadfast resistance of well-paid Doctors, who see Midwifery as competition to be crushed.
 
Gonzomin said:
Part of our national problem was that unions fought to get healthcare for the workers. Most Dem presidents, even before FDR wanted to get a single-payer system in effect. They knew that America not having a national healthcare system was a mistake. But America has always been run by the wealthy. They think denying peace of mind to all citizens will cost money that they could pocket.
So we had nothing. Unions fought to get healthcare in their contracts. Once they succeeded, other companies had to do the same to draw workers. So health coverage fell on companies across the nation.
This is a terrible system. Companies competing globally have to do so with the cost and maintenance of healthcare costs on their books. It is just a bad system that cannot be defended.
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Commies always blaming Capitalism,which built this great country!
 
PoliTalker said:
The countries that use Midwifery for most births have better outcomes, fewer mothers and babies killed, and IT COSTS THEM LESS.

We are paying more for lower quality.
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Having had 2 kids in the last 3 years, I can say without a doubt I'd have preferred this method. Here is the insane part.

The bill for my son's birth was $23,000 USD for a natural birth, no epidural, no anestesia; single night stay and release 24 hours later.

We inquired about a doula/home birth with a midwife; the cost for the midwife would have been $3,000.

They denied the midwife/home birth.

But, americans love their health insurance!

In the end, why is it that a home birth is not covered? Why is it I had to tell the doctors at the hospital I refused to stay a second night? Why is it that the system encourages and in fact enables this sort of graft? Why is it?

Well. Hospital networks command massive power in the healthcare industry. I've posted articles about this on other forums, but essentially, if a hospital network becomes large enough they can threaten insurers if those insurers do not accept their terms.

https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog...-merging-but-why-should-you-care-201504017844

This is an egregious and hidden agenda from the public.

The only answer is single payer, where the power of the public is levied against these grand standing cunts in the healthcare industry.
 
Hello Terry Trollinski,

Terry Trollinski said:
Commies always blaming Capitalism,which built this great country!
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I can't recall a single poster here who claims to be a communist. And the idea that capitalism alone is responsible for this great country is loaded with misconceptions.

If capitalism built this great country then it was great before Trump took office, which means his slogan was nonsense.

But capitalism did not solely make America great. Capitalism ran us into the ground and caused the Great Depression, out of which came much of the socialism which stabilized the economy and provided a minimum standard of living for America's poor. Hence, capitalism only partly contributed to making America great. Our middle class only emerged after socialism was instituted in the 30's. Most of WWII returning vets were able to begin building wealth because they got the GI Bill. They were able to go to college and buy homes. And when they retired, they got Social Security. We taxed the rich at levels over 90% adn used the money to build interstates, airports, schools and hospitals. and we went to the moon.
 
Hello and welcome Year Zero,

Year Zero said:
Having had 2 kids in the last 3 years, I can say without a doubt I'd have preferred this method. Here is the insane part.

The bill for my son's birth was $23,000 USD for a natural birth, no epidural, no anestesia; single night stay and release 24 hours later.

We inquired about a doula/home birth with a midwife; the cost for the midwife would have been $3,000.

They denied the midwife/home birth.

But, americans love their health insurance!

In the end, why is it that a home birth is not covered? Why is it I had to tell the doctors at the hospital I refused to stay a second night? Why is it that the system encourages and in fact enables this sort of graft? Why is it?

Well. Hospital networks command massive power in the healthcare industry. I've posted articles about this on other forums, but essentially, if a hospital network becomes large enough they can threaten insurers if those insurers do not accept their terms.

https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog...-merging-but-why-should-you-care-201504017844

This is an egregious and hidden agenda from the public.

The only answer is single payer, where the power of the public is levied against these grand standing cunts in the healthcare industry.
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Thanks for the link. I intend to read that and comment on that as well.

Thank you for speaking up. Yup, that's more of the rent-seeking the healthcare industry engages in. Basically it is legalized corruption. In this case, they have prevented insurers from even covering their competition, thus locking the competition out. Since the competition is so affordably priced, this wastes American healthcare dollars and forces the hand of mothers by limiting their options. They take everybody's health care dollars in the form of insurance payments from their employers typically (instead of simply paying the money to the worker and allowing them the freedom of choice,) and then they dictate how those dollars will be spent (NOT on natural births or midwifery.) Of course they perpetuate the myths that these other options are not safe. That one can be seen coming a mile away. The reality is that midwife assisted births have better outcomes than hospital births. They are well trained and they only take the low risk cases, and they know how to identify problems early enough to make a timely transfer to the hospital if needed. For these reasons, their insurance is FAR lower than that of an OB-GYN, and thus their fees are far lower as well.

The greedy health care industry summarily shuts out this viable competition.
 
The real problem is that the profession creates its own pricing. Anyone with that power will loot. Doctors, hospitals Insurance companies and durable goods are taking advantage of that power.
 
Hello Gonzomin,

Gonzomin said:
The real problem is that the profession creates its own pricing. Anyone with that power will loot. Doctors, hospitals Insurance companies and durable goods are taking advantage of that power.
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That and a host of other related problems which are created when power junkies try to force their way. When powerful medical lobbies force regulations that make it nearly impossible to practice midwifery the result is some try to take things into there own hands when they clearly should not. If natural birth midwifery was accepted and utilized to it's potential to be 'part of the system' we'd have far fewer problems associated with birth.

One of the things doctors do to shut competition is refuse to be a back-up for Midwives. Can you imagine? Petulantly refusing to practice medicine where it is clearly needed. Well, that makes it quite impossible to practice Midwifery with no back-up. Midwives are not doctors, so they must rely on having committed back-up in case things don't go well. If they don't then you can get a total train wreck. Here is a rare but compelling case of a Midwife who wished she had a back-up doctor on call. Without one, she apparently decided to try to take matters into her own hands and almost caused a tragedy:

"ROLAND, Okla. - Attorney General Mike Hunter filed charges Friday against a midwife after a close call for one first-time mom.

The attorney general says the charges are for "practicing medicine without a license after an investigation revealed she performed a medical procedure during a recent home birth after the victim was in labor for nearly three days."

"I think the mother and the baby are lucky to be alive," said Oklahoma Attorney General Mike Hunter.

It's a memory that was supposed to be magical for Suzie Bigler, but it turned into a nightmare.

"I`ve never had a baby before so I didn`t know what to expect," said Bigler.

Court documents show Bigler was at the Babies Choice Childbirth that is owned and operated by Debra Disch.

Debra Disch, and out of hospital midwife, was working with Bigler during birth.

An affidavit says Disch arrived at Babies Choice Childbirth Center on May 25th after being in labor for 32 hours at home.

After several more hours of labor, the problems started.

A grandmother, who the document says is a licensed registered nurse, asked Disch to take Bigler's vitals.

The affidavit says, "Disch got in the family member's face yelling at her that she had 36 years of experience."

"She was like 'everything is fine, don`t worry, this is normal' and so I trusted her," said Bigler.

That trust was tested when Bigler says, "she looked up at me and said we need to do an Episiotomy and I`ve never done one before."

Shortly after the procedure, Bigler's baby was born but she says the complications continued.

According to the affidavit the baby was "not breathing, was blue, and that Disch started CPR and while performing CPR, Disch dropped the infant."

"I was just saying Spencer I need you to wake up I need you to talk to mom. I need you to cry for me," said Bigler.

After what Bigler "described as what felt like a long time, the baby started breathing."

"They hand him to me and I stand up to move to the bed and blood just pours out of me," said Bigler.

The affidavit says Bigler was then "moved to a bed where Disch administered two shots in each leg. When asked what she was given, Disch stated that it was Pitocin after both shots had already been administered."

Bigler and her son spent three days in the hospital."

Mother and child lucky to be alive after botched birth that lacked proper medical support
 
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