Did you think I was being silly
fearing an expense not covered by my Medicaid?
It’s convenient to me to offer
these notes in a separate entry, rather than insert them as special notes into
the previous blog entry.
This relates to the
parenthetical part near the end of the previous entry, when I said “Add to this
the fact that I don’t really trust this [Medicaid] insurance, enough to get any
service beyond the minimum I’ve usually gotten (because what if I went for,
say, a heart stress test, and then found I was being billed directly for some
aspect of it for which the service-provider wouldn’t take Medicaid?)….”
What I was thinking about were,
implicitly or not, a few things.
First, my GP doctor I’ve seen for years, whom I generally find
satisfactory, recently has suggested a colonoscopy (by an outside doctor), over
a number of visits. He has twice recommended X doctor in the county (a foreign
name; I don’t remember it now), but said I should check to see if that doctor
takes Medicaid. (This point said at two different times.)
Which, to me, was one good
reason, among several, not to have a colonoscopy done in the near future. (A) Colon
cancer, to my knowledge, doesn’t run in my family (ancestors and other blood
relatives). (B) I have never had general anesthesia, and am not quick to try it
in the near future. (C) There is the possibility, however slim, I might get
billed in part for the procedure. ([D] There are reports in the media that
colonoscopies are, in some cases [where the risk of a real health problem is
low], nothing so much as a big money-maker for the relevant providers U.S.
health-care system.)
Bottom line: I am in no rush to
get a colonoscopy done.
The second good cause for concern, and the more colorful one, is this:
In the 14+ years of my mother’s cancer treatments and periodic follow-ups
(scans), etc., way back in the 2001-02 period, when she was first getting
treated, there was an instance where, after I forget which set of therapy (over
months, she had all of several chemo treatments, a five-week period of radiation,
and eventual surgery; but in this case it may have been after one of her rounds
of chemo), she had to get and use some—I forget the medicine’s name, but it was
a new thing for boosting white blood cell count. According to her very cordial
chemo oncologist, the hospital (UMDNJ, as it was called at the time) had paid
for this med in individual patients’ cases in the past, but at the moment it
couldn’t cover the cost, and I think Medicare wouldn’t cover it, so my mother
had to pay for it.
The cost for a bundled set of
several shots of the med was over
$1,000. I’ve had a memory it was between $1,000 and $2,000, but my mother has remembered
it as $3,000-and-something, and she is probably right. Anyway, her credit card (Visa,
I think) wouldn’t accept the charge—her card had a limit on the size of
charges, or something like that. So, with ad hoc decision-making in motion, I
used my American Express card to pay for it (I’d had an Amex card since 1984),
and she eventually paid me back (by check, maybe), to cover the charge to my
card.
Today, for my own health needs
(which have had considerably less medical attention than my mother has received
for hers), I could not afford to pay thousands for a sudden unexpected medical
expense that is not covered by my Medicaid, i.e., to pay via credit/debit card
or any other way.
Hopefully, if I get profoundly sick
where I might need to pay such charges, I either by wonderful luck am living permanently
in Canada, or I die quickly.
That’s where we stand with the
U.S. health-care system.
##
Yes, this entry could have had
the banner:
Also fits this series: Medical Waste: An occasional series on the
absurdity to be found in the U.S.
