The Very-Many-Questions-Not-Worth-Their-Own-Thread Thread ΛΕ

[Lexicus]

I think taking it as an insult is virtually unique to you tho

 

[MaryKB]

Thank you all, and thank you @Synsensa I think it's incredibly sweet what you're saying, but I don't feel offended by his suggestion. I wasn't sure if what I feel is normal that everyone feels, or if I should really talk to my doctor about it (I see him next month, so I'll mention this). I tried googling what I feel and I couldn't find anything, so I don't know if it's serious, right? I get this when I'm feeling especially tired, it's not like I feel like this regularly, only once in a while, and I desperately need to close my eyes, but just for a few minutes. I think I would describe it as like I can physically feel my tiredness as some sort of presence in my chest, if I'm making any sense? But like it totally goes away as I rest, and then I feel like myself again, and really I actually sort of feel a bit of a high when it goes away, you know?

But I thank you very much, I totally will bring this up to my doctor when I see him.

 

[Lexicus]

Thank you all, and thank you @Synsensa I think it's incredibly sweet what you're saying, but I don't feel offended by his suggestion. I wasn't sure if what I feel is normal that everyone feels, or if I should really talk to my doctor about it (I see him next month, so I'll mention this). I tried googling what I feel and I couldn't find anything, so I don't know if it's serious, right? I get this when I'm feeling especially tired, it's not like I feel like this regularly, only once in a while, and I desperately need to close my eyes, but just for a few minutes. I think I would describe it as like I can physically feel my tiredness as some sort of presence in my chest, if I'm making any sense? But like it totally goes away as I rest, and then I feel like myself again, and really I actually sort of feel a bit of a high when it goes away, you know?

But I thank you very much, I totally will bring this up to my doctor when I see him.

This jives up basically with what I was trying to say, which is that not knowing whether I should go to the doctor about [insert complaint here] is a pretty normal feeling. I don't want to leave something really bad undiagnosed and undealt-with, but I also don't want to waste the doctor's time (and my darn copay, I guess they don't have to worry about that in Canada tho) with something that doesn't require the doctor's help (or just isn't even a real problem).

 

[Timsup2nothin]

One of the big obstacles in medicine is that there is no basis for language. It is completely possible that everyone feels exactly the same thing that @MaryKB is feeling, but describing it differently. It is equally possible that when she describes it to her doctor the doctor will translate it into something entirely different from what it is. You feel what you feel, and since no one else can feel it there is no common experience upon which to build a description.

 

[Synobun]

I think taking it as an insult is virtually unique to you tho

Thoughts and prayers.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

This jives up basically with what I was trying to say, which is that not knowing whether I should go to the doctor about [insert complaint here] is a pretty normal feeling. I don't want to leave something really bad undiagnosed and undealt-with, but I also don't want to waste the doctor's time (and my darn copay, I guess they don't have to worry about that in Canada tho) with something that doesn't require the doctor's help (or just isn't even a real problem).

There is an error here, and that error is at the root of the problem with every system ever invented for managing the distribution of health care.

The doctor's time isn't wasted. He gets paid exactly the same for diagnosing something really bad as he gets paid for diagnosing something as nothing to worry about.

 

[Lexicus]

There is an error here, and that error is at the root of the problem with every system ever invented for managing the distribution of health care.

The doctor's time isn't wasted. He gets paid exactly the same for diagnosing something really bad as he gets paid for diagnosing something as nothing to worry about.

The doctor's time is wasted if we consider the use-value of time rather than its exchange value.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

The doctor's time is wasted if we consider the use-value of time rather than its exchange value.

If we do that the doctor's time is always wasted. The petty task of saving a life, or even worse just making you more comfortable, pales compared to the research that the doctor could be contributing to improving the lot of humanity as a whole. "I could have cured cancer, but I was busy treating a genital wart."

So, we're down to exchange value, which is really the only milieu appropriate for discussion of how to manage the distribution of health care. What's missing from your post that I commented on is that the genuinely harmful waste isn't your co-pay, it is the bulk of the payment. You omitting that illustrates the almost universal mindset that "paid by insurance" is equivalent to "rained down from the sky as if by magic." That mindset is what makes the current approach to health care distribution in the US so unworkable, and what people need to grasp is that with that mindset so ingrained and so widely held no system is going to work very well. Universal healthcare can't really work if hundreds of millions of people act as if healthcare just rains down from the sky and they can have all they ever wanted just by getting in line, even when they don't really need any.

 

[Traitorfish]

Can anyone tell me if it's normal how I feel like I have a heavy rock in my chest when I'm tired?

This (...) is not normal.

Not really seeing how this exchange warranted a page of third-party commentary tbh. (Noting the irony of adding that to commentary.)

 

[Lexicus]

So, we're down to exchange value,

I don't agree with your premise there at all so nah

So, we're down to exchange value, which is really the only milieu appropriate for discussion of how to manage the distribution of health care. What's missing from your post that I commented on is that the genuinely harmful waste isn't your co-pay, it is the bulk of the payment. You omitting that illustrates the almost universal mindset that "paid by insurance" is equivalent to "rained down from the sky as if by magic." That mindset is what makes the current approach to health care distribution in the US so unworkable, and what people need to grasp is that with that mindset so ingrained and so widely held no system is going to work very well. Universal healthcare can't really work if hundreds of millions of people act as if healthcare just rains down from the sky and they can have all they ever wanted just by getting in line, even when they don't really need any.

Well, I omitted that because I can't do anything about what the doctor is being paid, but I can conceivably avoid wasting a copay by asking around on the internet whether my symptoms are worth going to the doctor over.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

Well, I omitted that because I can't do anything about what the doctor is being paid, but I can conceivably avoid wasting a copay by asking around on the internet whether my symptoms are worth going to the doctor over.

You can do something about what the doctor is being paid for. If insurance premiums were being directed to doctors curing cancer and saving people's lives, even if those people are poor, I'd have no problem with insurance premiums; not even with the percentage being skimmed off for executives and shareholders. But when I know that the bulk of the premium is eventually coming around to being paid to doctors for treating random sniffles and a genital wart it pisses me off, no matter how small the premium might be or how it is collected.

 

[MaryKB]

I don't believe it's a zero sum game @Timsup2nothin, you know what I mean? I believe you can pay both medical researchers and doctors treating people, right? I mean, what's the point of doing medical research if no one's going to use it to help anyone and everyone is just left to suffer because all doctors are researchers now? I don't feel there's anything wrong at all with treating even mild ailments, I mean those are causing daily misery for people, right? And sometimes things can start off small and become larger problems later. Oh dear I'm terribly sorry if I'm confused, you just sound to me like you're saying doctors treating patients is a total waste of resources lol.

 

[Lexicus]

You can do something about what the doctor is being paid for. If insurance premiums were being directed to doctors curing cancer and saving people's lives, even if those people are poor, I'd have no problem with insurance premiums; not even with the percentage being skimmed off for executives and shareholders. But when I know that the bulk of the premium is eventually coming around to being paid to doctors for treating random sniffles and a genital wart it pisses me off, no matter how small the premium might be or how it is collected.

This isn't fundamentally a problem with the system for distributing healthcare resources, it's fundamentally a problem resulting from people having drastically unequal purchasing power.

I don't believe it's a zero sum game @Timsup2nothin, you know what I mean? I believe you can pay both medical researchers and doctors treating people, right? I mean, what's the point of doing medical research if no one's going to use it to help anyone and everyone is just left to suffer because all doctors are researchers now? I don't feel there's anything wrong at all with treating even mild ailments, I mean those are causing daily misery for people, right? And sometimes things can start off small and become larger problems later. Oh dear I'm terribly sorry if I'm confused, you just sound to me like you're saying doctors treating patients is a total waste of resources lol.

He's not saying that - he's pointing out, correctly in my view, a problem with the way we triage on health care. There is not a limited amount of money to pay people, but there is a finite number of doctors, technicians, etc., there is a finite amount of equipment they can use, and they all have the same number of hours per day as the rest of us do. The major problem with the US health care system is that people with lots of purchasing power are able to command the use of a very significant portion of those medical resources for basically no useful purpose, while there are plenty of real problems that go unsolved because there's no profit in solving them.

That is the problem with having a society where some people have more purchasing power than they could ever need, others have not enough purchasing power to sustain bare existence, and healthcare is distributed entirely according to who has purchasing power.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

I don't believe it's a zero sum game @Timsup2nothin, you know what I mean? I believe you can pay both medical researchers and doctors treating people, right? I mean, what's the point of doing medical research if no one's going to use it to help anyone and everyone is just left to suffer because all doctors are researchers now? I don't feel there's anything wrong at all with treating even mild ailments, I mean those are causing daily misery for people, right? And sometimes things can start off small and become larger problems later. Oh dear I'm terribly sorry if I'm confused, you just sound to me like you're saying doctors treating patients is a total waste of resources lol.

My mother, when she was seventy years old, was consuming about $250,000 a year in health care, none of which was doing anything much about her primary complaint, which was being old. This care cost her nothing, and was provided by an entire community of medical professionals who specialized in providing a wide array of services to elderly well insured patients.

It isn't a zero sum game, but there is definitely lost opportunity when waste of that magnitude is part of the system.

 

[caketastydelish]

I'm not sure where to put this. This is what you say to get that dream girl/guy to like you (only works today):

"Are you today's date? Because you're a 10/10."

 

[Lexicus]

My mother, when she was seventy years old, was consuming about $250,000 a year in health care, none of which was doing anything much about her primary complaint, which was being old. This care cost her nothing, and was provided by an entire community of medical professionals who specialized in providing a wide array of services to elderly well insured patients.

It isn't a zero sum game, but there is definitely lost opportunity when waste of that magnitude is part of the system.

It should be noted that there are any number of other examples, from basically every single economic sector, of inefficient resource-use driven by the mere existence of very rich people who face no real constraints on spending because they have more money than they could ever use. The most obvious example is probably the use of space on airplanes to accommodate elite tickets.

The economy as a whole, in the long-run, isn't a zero-sum game. But resources are finite at any given moment in time and they are being put to definite uses. Purchasing power is a very nifty and useful concept that is rarely heard about in mainstream economics, probably because analyzing it would give the lie to the bland assurance that everything is getting better as long as GDP per capita keeps going up.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

This isn't fundamentally a problem with the system for distributing healthcare resources, it's fundamentally a problem resulting from people having drastically unequal purchasing power.

Sure. However, people having drastically unequal purchasing power is a given in the problem. To say "we don't need to manage distribution of health care in a way that accounts for vast differences in purchasing power" is to say "what we need to do is develop a health care distribution management system that would work in some hypothetical place that is not here for a hypothetical society that is not us."

What we need is a health care distribution management system that will work reasonably well with decently equitable results inside the given conditions.

The failure is that we have approached this through methods that amplify the inequality of purchasing power through artificial creation of purchasing power, which creates artificial demand. You are one of the more socially conscious people I know, and even you don't stop to consider that there is more cost involved in a doctor visit than your copay. We have moved from the Rockafellers of the world having a personal physician and everyone else having to make do as best they could to having a vastly larger segment of the population called the insured having personal physicians leaving the smaller group called the uninsured to make do as best they can, and in the process made it a hundred times harder for them to make do. And it's not like that process created any greater equity between the insured and the Rockafellers either; I guarantee that their personal physicians are more numerous, more skilled, and more personal.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

It should be noted that there are any number of other examples, from basically every single economic sector, of inefficient resource-use driven by the mere existence of very rich people who face no real constraints on spending because they have more money than they could ever use.

Yeah, but that's not what I gave an example of. My mother wasn't a rich people. She didn't have more money than she could possibly use. In fact she eventually died penniless. She wielded immense purchasing power in one and only one area, health care. That artificially created purchasing power, with only one outlet, is what has driven the price of healthcare, and continues to drive it. Spreading such artificially created purchasing power to a wider group makes the problem worse, not better, unless you can change the mindset that leads to "since I have this purchasing power I may as well use it."

 

[Lexicus]

even you don't stop to consider that there is more cost involved in a doctor visit than your copay.

I do, actually, but in my post that sparked this exchange I will admit the decisive consideration is the social awkwardness or embarrassment from having the doctor say "uh...there is nothing actually wrong with you", not the health system resources that are wasted by my pointless visit to the doctor. Anyway, some degree of wastage of that sort will be inevitable even in a perfect healthcare system. Arguably, that's the kind of wastage we want - we want more pointless doctor's visits, and fewer emergency room trips because you didn't go to the doctor even though that pain in your stomach kept getting worse and worse for five years.

Yeah, but that's not what I gave an example of. My mother wasn't a rich people. She didn't have more money than she could possibly use. In fact she eventually died penniless. She wielded immense purchasing power in one and only one area, health care. That artificially created purchasing power, with only one outlet, is what has driven the price of healthcare, and continues to drive it. Spreading such artificially created purchasing power to a wider group makes the problem worse, not better, unless you can change the mindset that leads to "since I have this purchasing power I may as well use it."

I don't disagree with any of this, obviously. It's a classic side-effect of the "have the government pay as much as necessary to for-profit corporations" approach to solving social problems. But my point about purchasing power is generally applicable, not only to the healthcare system.

 

[bernie14]

My mother, when she was seventy years old, was consuming about $250,000 a year in health care, none of which was doing anything much about her primary complaint, which was being old. This care cost her nothing, and was provided by an entire community of medical professionals who specialized in providing a wide array of services to elderly well insured patients.

It isn't a zero sum game, but there is definitely lost opportunity when waste of that magnitude is part of the system.

So, we should kill your dog so that insulin can be put to better use?