Maintenance

Common Sense Solutions to America’s Health Insurance “Crisis”

Insurance works best when it’s rarely used. That’s why life, automobile and homeowner’s insurance are relatively affordable.

Death occurs only once, and we make every effort to avoid it. Auto insurance isn’t designed to reimburse us for oil changes, gasoline, car washes or tires. We don’t use our homeowner’s insurance to pay for light bulbs, lawn maintenance, cleaning people or paint.

Shouldn’t health insurance work the same way?

Ordinary health maintenance should not be treated as an event that triggers insurance coverage. Health maintenance should be encouraged, but not financed by an insurance company. Insurance should be limited to unpredictable and expensive medical events that seldom occur… the way all other types of insurance perform.

Deductibles that are too low, doctor visit co-pays and first dollar coverage for prescription drugs, encourage people to overuse health care services. They also drive insurance premiums to a level completely beyond the value of any benefits received.

Insurance companies are in business to make money, remember?

Your premiums are calculated to exceed the cost of any benefits that are likely to be paid out. On average, you would need to run to the doctor every month in order to justify and break even on the additional cost of a having an office visit co-pay benefit. Realistically, have you ever been that sick?

Prescription co-pay coverage can easily account for over 25% of the cost of insurance… and over 95% of the population is better off just paying cash at the pharmacy!

The term “medical insurance” has become a misnomer. The general definition of an “insurable event”… whether a traffic accident, tornado, heart attack or spinal injury… is something that is (1) unlikely to happen; (2) will occur without warning; (3) is not something that the insured person wants to happen; and (4) would create a severe financial hardship if paid for out-of-pocket. This definition applies to catastrophic health events… serious illnesses and injuries. It does not apply to routine health maintenance, does it?

Homeowner’s insurance covers fires, roofs destroyed by falling trees, and other costly events. Automobile insurance covers major damage and theft. But what passes as health insurance has expanded to include just about everything, including the routine, the predictable, and the easily affordable.

And, as you know, there’s no such thing as a free lunch!

Most health insurance plans use co-pays as the method of cost sharing. Co-pays became a standard part of drug-benefit and doctor-visit coverage during the managed care revolution of the 1990s. However, they are not consistent with any rational health plan design. When something is free or inexpensive, there is an overwhelming tendency to consume as much of it as possible. If there is very little cost (at the point-of-service) to see your doctor, why not schedule a visit for the sniffles, or pop the latest, greatest pill?

Co-pays are helping fuel the health insurance crisis in America.

The overuse and abuse of coverage is what drives annual double-digit cost increases. Insurance companies are forced to either pass on the costs in the form of rate increases or to reduce coverage… often in areas that can bring about financial devastation at claim time!

So, ironically, a major reason that health insurance has become so expensive is because co-pay medical care appears so cheap!

The Solution…

Health insurance is needed to protect against large medical expenses. The majority of our insurance agents (and their most enlightened clients) select high-deductible health plans for themselves and their families… to protect against true medical emergencies… and they “self-insure” for doctor visits and prescription drugs.

Doctors are often quite willing to offer deep discounts to those who are willing to pay in full by cash at the time of the visit because they rid themselves of the time spent coding and filing insurance claims. And most insurance companies offer prescription drug discount programs, free of charge.

In fact, outpatient prescription drug coverage should be a non-issue with the advent of low-cost retail generic drugs. Wal-Mart pioneered the concept of charging only $4 for generic drugs, and now more in-store pharmacies are adopting similar pricing. The good news is that there’s a generic equivalent, if not an exact chemical copy, of virtually every brand name drug in the world. So why waste hard-earned dollars on a $10 Rx co-pay plan?

This returns health insurance to its original purpose and eliminates administrative expenses for small claims. And with the variety of low-cost alternatives to high-priced health plans that are readily available… even for the least healthy among us… as health insurance premiums drop through the floor, those savings will almost always offset any potential additional out-of-pocket expenses.

Mark Goldstein is president of The Producers Alliance, a national independent insurance marketing organization. His specialty is recruiting, training, and developing top producing independent health and life agents.

Mark was the number one health insurance producer for The National Business Association from 1995 through 1998 and the top agency manager for American Republic Insurance from 1999 through 2001, before launching The Producers Alliance… http://www.TheProducersAlliance.net… in September of 2001.

Mark Goldstein can be reached at (877)442-0698 or by email at Mark@TheProducersAlliance.net.

Discount Diabetic Supplies: Low-Cost Options For Your Health Maintenance

March 2, 2010 by admin

Diabetes is a disease that affects hundreds of thousands of people each year: without the proper management, diabetes can keep people from leading healthy, productive lives. Diabetes disease management, however, is not only difficult but costly. People with some types of diabetes need frequent insulin shots, or have to take oral insulin, both of which can be expensive. As a result, discount diabetic supplies are in high demand.

What diabetic medical supplies are required, and why are they needed by diabetics? Because diabetics can also suffer from a wide variety of complications, they also need to undergo different treatment regimens that can help ease these complications. Such complications can include cardiovascular disease, renal or kidney failure, liver failure, hypertension, and general organ and tissue damage.

Why is Insulin So Important?

There are three principal types of diabetes, and all of them involve the inability of pancreatic cells to produce the metabolic hormone insulin. Insulin aids in the breakdown of complex sugars and carbohydrates into forms that the body can use for energy. If insulin is not present in large quantities, or if insulin is not present in functional form, sugar levels can increase substantially in the blood. This can cause widespread tissue and organ damage, and, in extreme cases, result in sugar shock and eventual coma.

Type I Diabetes

Type I diabetes was once called juvenile diabetes, as it was often found and diagnosed in children. Type I diabetes is essentially an autoimmune disease. People with Type I diabetes have overactive immune systems that destroy the insulin-producing cells of the pancreas, so that they require constant doses of insulin.

Type II

Type II diabetes develops in adulthood, and is often associated with obesity, which scientists find is a large risk factor for this type of diabetes. In Type II diabetes, the body’s tissues and organs are resistant to insulin. This condition is similar to the third type of diabetes, which is called gestational or pregnancy-induced diabetes. Gestational diabetes arises because higher levels of pregnancy hormones can make organs more resistant to insulin; this diabetes type, however, generally disappears after delivery.

Insulin therefore has to be produced in large amounts in order to cater to the needs of rising numbers of people suffering from diabetes. This important hormone was once sourced from cadaver pancreases, which was a highly inefficient method that made insulin shots expensive. In the advent of recombinant DNA technology, however, microbial cells are used to produce large amounts of human insulin, which can then be harvested and purified from the microbial culture.

Today, insulin is available in oral or tablet form, which can be useful in dealing with all types of diabetes. However, insulin shots work best for Type II diabetics who are too far advanced in the disease and whose bodies do not have adequate resources to respond to tablets. Recently, insulin has also been approved in inhaled form, although this type of insulin is prescribed for people suffering from Type I diabetes.

What are Diabetic Supplies Used For?

In general, diabetic insulin supplies can be expensive: if not in oral form, people suffering from diabetes need syringes and specifically designed inhalers to deliver insulin. For people who are far advanced in the disease, dialysis machines can be in demand in order to clean out the kidneys or liver, and generally rid the body of toxins that its organs can no longer properly dispose of.

Many corporations and insurance companies can be contacted to provide information on diabetes supplies, as well as free diabetes supplies for patients who are in immediate need of therapy. For instance, Liberty diabetic supplies and Medicare are common examples of providers that work closely with doctors in ensuring proper medical care for diabetics, as well as efficient disease management.

Supplies For Diabetic Complications

There are also medical supplies that are used in therapy regimens that deal with complications of diabetes. For instance, diabetes can impede blood circulation and can damage the nerves of the feet. People with diabetes often need to undergo foot amputation in order to get rid of gangrenous tissue or foot ulcers. To prevent this from occurring, physicians will often prescribe physical therapy, which can require special machines to carry out. Physical therapy can keep nerves active, and muscles toned.

If you are suffering from any form of diabetes, you might be recommended some forms of therapy that will require you to purchase discount diabetic supplies. Always consult with your doctors and insurance company about them, as well as low-cost or free alternatives that are reliable and matched to your needs. With good maintenance, you can keep your diabetes in check, and you can still be healthy.

Visit Learn-About-Diabetes.com to learn more about discount diabetic supplies and diabetes sugar count.