canada's healthcare mess

[Cyberm4n]

the whole country requires and overhaul of medical services. from province to province you see different levels of care. and no, quebec is no different to the rest of canada. the whole system is not working because of lack of funding and the federal government's refusal to change the way things are done.

they waste hundreds of millions of dollars per year while the healthcare system throughout this country is on it's last breath. ottawa had better fix the mess the liberals have made and bring our medical funding, at the least, back to pre1995 levels. this is just crazy, ottawa isnt a circus, they're a government. i cannot wait to see the liberal government lose their long held place on the throne. i would even be happy if the conservatives took over at this rate, nobody can do a worse job than the liberals to our system. we are going no where.

what TenPenny said:To give you some background on that story:

(I was living and working in Quebec for many months, and after about 2.5 months, I got really sick with a flu/cold/throat infection. It doesnt sound that bad -- but it was really bad, I could barely even walk! I went to a public walkin clinic and they asked for my health insurance card. I provided my Ontario Health Card, which did NOT go over well at all. Anyways, I got "no, we cant accept this", we need cash. After a couple minutes of bickering, I asked to see the head doctor. He came out at about 15 minutes of waiting. I demanded to receive health care covered by my province. Under the constitution I am entitled to global healthcare around the country. If they didnt see to me, I could; and would not hesitate to sue under the constitution.

Anyways, after some threats and bickering, they gave me a form to fill out so they could bill my host province (Ontario). I have heard of similar situations in hospitals - but have not had any problems there. By the way, the clinics are public facilities offered by the province of Quebec.)

To expand on that story, Quebec is well known by doctors elsewhere for paying the least for Medicare billings, or refusing to pay altogether, so you will often find, if you are a Quebecer, that you have trouble getting service in other parts of the country. That's because the doctor might have to fight for 6 months to get paid by Quebec for seeing you. Isn't Medicare great?

 

[Koga Ringo]

i cannot wait to see the liberal government lose their long held place on the throne. i would even be happy if the conservatives took over at this rate, nobody can do a worse job than the liberals to our system. we are going no where.

AMEN!!!

They have made their intensions clear, and its time for an actual Responsible Government that it was intended for.

 

[TenPenny]

As far as not doing any worse than the Liberals, I think we'll see. And I think Harper is just the man to do worse.

But back to Health Care: Quebec is, indeed, no different, except that they are the most difficult province for out of province doctors to get their money from. The major difficulty is that Healthcare is a provincial responsibility, so, although the feds set the standards for medical care, each province does things differently.

I'm not sure that just heaping more money on the system is the answer, but the system certainly does need some help. I think the day is approaching (faster than you might think) that people simply don't have a "family doctor" anymore; fewer and fewer people want to be a family doctor, and it's obvious why.

There certainly is a case to be made for completely revamping how the system works. Right now, it's better than the US system, but it still needs improvement.

 

[Koga Ringo]

As far as not doing any worse than the Liberals, I think we'll see. And I think Harper is just the man to do worse.

Oh give me a break. Did you know that about 50% of the entire health care fund goes to elderly people with cancer? 90% of these people are smokers, and have smoked their entire lives. 10% of these people will continue smoking.

Is that where you want your health care money to go? To $20,000
surgeries every week on the same person just because he/she wanted to smoke their entire life.

I personally am disgusted buy it.

I'm not sure that just heaping more money on the system is the answer, but the system certainly does need some help. I think the day is approaching (faster than you might think) that people simply don't have a "family doctor" anymore; fewer and fewer people want to be a family doctor, and it's obvious why.

Yeah, because most of the money goes to people dying from smoking their whole lives, so there isn't enough to give to new doctors so most of them head south for more money.

There certainly is a case to be made for completely revamping how the system works. Right now, it's better than the US system, but it still needs improvement.

Thanks to the Liberals.

 

[Numure]

As far as not doing any worse than the Liberals, I think we'll see. And I think Harper is just the man to do worse.

Oh give me a break. Did you know that about 50% of the entire health care fund goes to elderly people with cancer? 90% of these people are smokers, and have smoked their entire lives. 10% of these people will continue smoking.

Is that where you want your health care money to go? To $20,000
surgeries every week on the same person just because he/she wanted to smoke their entire life.

I personally am disgusted buy it.
.

Only lung Cancer is related to smoking, dummy. Lung Cancers arnt as rampant as you might think. There is a form of cancer related to every part of your body. Some are curable, but most arnt. I believe Breast Cancer comes first in all, though not quite sure.

 

[TenPenny]

50% of the money goes to old people dying of cancer? Do you actually have a clue what you are talking about? Didn't think so. Please acquaint yourself with a few facts before you toss out those numbers.

Try these ones:

--- Overall, the total cost of illness in 1998 in Canada was $159 billion, of which $84 billion (53 per cent) were direct costs and $75 billion (47 per cent) indirect costs. Just over one-half (55 per cent) of these total costs could be attributed to a specific disease. Of these disease-specific costs, $14.2 billion (nine per cent of the total cost of illness), was related to cancer, which is ranked third in total costs after cardiovascular (12 per cent) and muscoloskeletal (10 per cent) diseases.

--- Of the total indirect costs of illness in Canada in 1998 ($75 billion), cancer accounted for $11.8 billion (16 per cent), ranking second to musculoskeletal diseases. Cancer accounted for almost one-third of premature death costs (32 per cent), reflecting the fact that cancer is the leading cause of premature death in Canada. Eight per cent of the costs of premature death due to all diseases was accounted for by lung cancer alone (or 26 per cent of the total due to cancer).

As far as the suggestion that more money is spent on elderly people, my only comment is DUH! Older people get sick more often and more severely than young people.

Hop on the clue train, Koga Ringo. It's leaving you behind.

 

[thoughtful]

In Ontario we need beds. Now is not the time to be blaming people for 'getting themselves sick'. We need to treat whoever is ailing.
Small town hospitals (the few there are left) are packed to the rafters. They are a holding zone for everything from long term care to rehab to psych to patients who will never make it to advanced treatment. Resources are maxed, nurses are exhausted ...

 

[Démocrite]

Is that where you want your health care money to go?

I want my money spent whenever someone is sick, whatever the reason is. It's a simple rule. No discrimination. You're sick, you get health care.

 

[ThorsHamburger]

I saw a study done by a US panel comparing admin costs of the uS vs. Cnandian system and found the Canadian system less costly and more efficient.
We need more funding. I believe the system itself is great but needs tweaks . I have also heard this from Canandian and US experts talking about our healthcare sytem.Also many US doctors that want our type of health care in the US.
I odnt have all the asnwers but the first two things I would try and do would be:
1. Show explictly the deduction for health care off each paycheck.
What this wold do would keep people aware that they are in fact paying for it. Oneof the big problems in our system is abuse. Many people say " our healthcare is free". Its not and anything to remind people of this would be good.
2. And this may be difficult. I would base the health care deduction partly on income but within a particular income range there would be deductions and reimbursments for health conditions.
Mandatory yearly checkups would assess your state of health and based on that info you pay accordingly.
If you live unhealthy you pay more.
Also your visits would be tracked and assessed as part of this. If you are abusing the system, you pay more.
Sounds contraversial but something needs to be done to change the way people take the system for granted.

 

[TenPenny]

I like the idea of making sure people know what they pay for healthcare. At least then, we would value it.

In case anyone out there doesn't understand how the system works, let me explain:

You go to your family doctor (assuming you have one) because, for example, you have a bad cold. You walk into the office, are greeted by the receptionist, and sit down to wait. (Maybe quite a while).

When you see the doctor, if you have a simple, straightforward issue, you will spend 6 minutes or so with them, then out the door. Your doctor will record your name, medicare number, etc etc. The doctor then submits your name, your medicare number, the date, and the reason you were there, to the provincial health dept. For this simple office visit, your doctor will get, maybe $25.

If you are from out of province, the doctor will submit the data to the other province, and will be paid at whatever rate the other province decides is fair.

From this $25, the doctor will pay their rent, office overhead, and salaries for any staff, like the receptionist.

Do the math: If each person seen takes 6 min, that's 10 people per hour; 10 x $25 = $250 per hour. Sounds good, doesn't it? Not really. Talked to any good lawyers, lately? Paid any receptionists' salaries lately? Remember, this money is the gross income, that has to pay for rent and salaries and office expenses. And that's why most times, if you have forms to fill out, or someone wants a letter written, you have to pay extra. What happens is that the doctor spends as much time writing letters as seeing patients. And that's a waste of time.

So why did you have to wait so long in the reception area? Well, usually it's because you come in, take your first 5 min, then, on the way out the door, it's "oh, by the way, what I really wanted to ask you about was this chest pain I get every time I work hard"....or, it's a case of "I brought my mother in with me, too, because she has been having fainting spells. Do you mind seeing her?"

 

[researchok]

Never mind salaries and rent-- that's the easy part.

When the doctor is done with that, he's got to face the ever present tax man.

 

[TenPenny]

The overhead comes off first; then the taxman gets a big chunk of the rest. What people often don't understand is that a doctor is a small businessman; they bill the gov't for services, and have to pay all the normal costs of operating a business, including rent and salaries.....

 

[thoughtful]

And malpractice insurance which, especially for ob's, is exorbinate.

 

[T. Rex]

Canada is in a big health mess because of Liberal wasted money ... that is why we are so broke now. They waste and waste and then more waste.

It will take a long time to recover from over a decade of Liberal ****up. There will have to be money spent in a large format to recover at least in part.

You cannot keep throwing money into a healthcare system that is so wasteful and inefficient. There will be big changes in the future.

 

[Haggis McBagpipe]

Re: overhead. We're not talking one doctor/one office. Doctors double up, as it were, more often triple up, quadriple up. They share the expenses, overhead is greatly reduced as a result.

As for taxes, you can be assured that doctors are not paying a fraction of what the average Joe Blow is paying. If you know of any doctors, take a good look at where they live, what they drive. These are not poor souls barely making ends meet, believe me. They are living right up there with the aforementioned lawyers.

There's nothing wrong with our health care system that some tweaks, as Thor mentioned, would not fix. To toss it out in favour of an American-style health care system would be patently ludicrous. The US health care system is entirely at the mercy of the HMOs.

Doctors do not make the decisions about your care in the States, the insurance companies do, and they are, surprise, surprise, in it for the money, so you'd better believe needed surgeries and treatments are declined. There are some good HMOs, but there are far more bad HMOs, and your health is in the hands of insurance guys, not doctors. Not hard to see what is wrong with that picture.

In fact, the insurance companies are moving away from calling physicians 'doctors', preferring, instead, to call them 'health care providers' and other such terms... seemingly to put them, as it were, in their place as the relatively powerless middlemen that they have become.

 

[NSSM]

I really wish people would stop looking at politicians as if they are expected to be these perfect beings that are going to deliver on all promises and make our country perfect. That is nothing but reverie about a Utopic State that will never exist. Are there problems with health care? Of course. Will there always be problems with health care? Of course. It's the DEGREE to which we have problems that makes the difference. Many people are pointing the finger at the Liberals right now, because they feel like maybe their time is up. Let me suggest that if you like the way our economy has been in the past several years, then you had better vote Liberal. Let's not forget the productive aspects of the current government. Also, let's not forget that they inherited a huge mess from the P.C.s, a party that did not even have party status when the populus was finished with them. People love to convince themselves that changing things up is the answer, but I'm not even convinced that people in general understand the question. If you value this country and our health care and our economy, then there is only one choice...Paul Martin!!!

 

[Démocrite]

I am not sure you undertand the question yourself. There is no such thing as a Canadian Health care system. Apart from you're nice partisan plea in favour of the Liberals, there is nothing relevant in your text.

Have you went throught the Romanow report and the Séguin report? Have you ever heard about the fiscal imbalance?

I suggest you read those. Being condescending won't help you make your point. It's like assuming that people on this forum are stupid and ignorant.

Before preaching to people you should look at yourself and try to better understand the issue.

 

[TenPenny]

Your comments about overhead, doubling up, etc are interesting. However: the average Canadian GP spends 30-50% of their GROSS income on office overhead. What is left is what is income for tax purposes.

Depending on the setup, many specialists spend a much lower percentage on overhead, due to working out of hospitals, not private offices.

In the US, of course, it is the HMOs and insurance companies who determine what you can and cannot do.

In fact, many plans in the US have a LIFETIME cap for your claims; god forbid you have a major problem when you're in your 20's, because you WON'T have anything left for later.

 

[Haggis McBagpipe]

In fact, many plans in the US have a LIFETIME cap for your claims; god forbid you have a major problem when you're in your 20's, because you WON'T have anything left for later.

I thought nothing could surprise me with American HMOs, but you got me on that one. Amazing that it has come to that, allowing big business to have a say in one's health care.

I think many Canadians favour an American-style health system because they read/hear the pro-American hype. Much has been written Stateside to show a negative slant on our system and a positive slant on their system. This is done, I think, to keep Americans from wanting what we have (for there are many who do). It also has the effect of making many Canadians think the same.

What I hear the most from Americans is that socialism = loss of freedom, therefore socialist medicine takes away freedom. Strange reasoning, but there you have it.

 

[ThorsHamburger]

The problem with the American system is that its TOO privatized and doesnt have a strong public system to back it up. The Canadian system lacks flexibility and funding. We have the opportunity to create the best system but it can only happen by having a strong public and private system exist side by side. Its essentially about problem solving. The more options you have the more problems can be solved and in a better way and for more people.