She literally called me at the time of the appointment to tell me she can't see me. She was so apologetic, but was like "I absolutely can treat you, but I'm not allowed by your insurance". Fuck this country.
Update: I went to urgent care. Before leaving home, I called to be sure they would accept my insurance (Aetna). They said yes.. After arriving for my appointment, they told me they do not accept my insurance. I will simply leave without paying.
Final Update: I can understand that that differences in physical biology demand different attention. That's not what I'm complaining about. It's the way it's set up. I was told that at my appointment. Why not just refer me to a specialist? The website could've even just referred me to urgent care (yes, my insurance requires a primary care physician's referral for urgent care, according to the urgent care facility). But, no, their goal is to obfuscate and irritate until the patient gives you and pays out-of-pocket.
I was able to receive care at a cost I could not afford. I won't discuss what I had to do to "find" the money to pay for care and prescriptions. That being said, the condition I was diagnosed with was more serious than a simple infection, and I'm glad that I saw a doctor. I need further treatment and just hope I can get insurance to cover any of it.
If you're an American reading this, please consider ways to get involved in organizing in support of Medicare For All in your community. Here is one resource I have found. We don't need to live like this. We deserve better. Stay safe and healthy, friends.
The entirely of modern America could be summarized with "Mildly Infiruating", tbh.
It is utterly baffling to me how the US has not figured out nationalized healthcare. Literally every other developped nation in the western hemisphere has at this point.
Its crazy that a politician could come out and say "my number one priority is to ensure that every American has access to healthcare, paid for by the state", and would instantly be villified by like half the country.
A handful of bastards at the top are making unfathomable amounts of wealth at the cost of the lives and future of the country. A majority of the country is in support of nationalizing health care. I've even met conservatives who agree. It's these sick fucking parasites who won't allow us to have it.
All the fuckers writing the laws have socialized healthcare. It's the untouchables who don't.
Because the healthcare industry makes money. A shitload of money. Why would they "fix" that? The problem is the fact that it is an industry.
The covid national emergency is declared over. Potentially up to 15 million people will lose Medicaid expansion. Florida already kicked off 600,000 people. An 87 year old who had a daily care taker lost access even though they were qualified after the cut. A 7 year old boy will now die because they took access to his leukemia treatment. About half the people still qualify but they are making everyone reapply.
My dad some how affords stupidly expensive healthcare. Premiums are $4,000 a month. ER copay is $1000. ER deductible is $18,400 per family. My mom is now on a medication that costs $1400 a day. With other meds her medication is $15,800 a month for the rest of her life (she is 59). With insurance it goes down to $28 She has had $100,000 in medical bills. She has some super rare condition. Our insurance said one of the out of network doctors was covered. My mom verified multiple times. Now they don’t want to cover that doctor so we are stuck with a $25,000 medical bill. My mom says she will put it on the lowest amount a month for the rest of her life.
In other words if my dad couldn’t afford this insurance she probably would be dead now or in a few months.
Crazy is that we are all Canadian and if we lived there we could go on OHIP plus extra insurance for a few hundred bucks a month. For those who say Canadian’s have wait times, so do we. The difference is you will be seen and will not go medically bankrupt or denied care because you are too poor.
The excuse is that Canadians come to America for better doctors with lower wait times. They do. But when you realize they come to the States they don’t have long term insurance. Meaning they pay out of pocket. So it’s wealthy Canadians that can afford insanely high prices.
All my family in Canada says my father is pissing away money. He is.
God Bless American Healthcare! /s
TLDR Doug Ford can sod off and go to hell.
Cancer and other life saving drugs in Canada can still be very expensive, we don't have universal drug coverage in Ontario. You can get coverage if your income is below a certain threshold (ie you are very poor) but if you don't have drug insurance here you are still fucked and can go into debt trying to stay alive or not suffer. It's better than America but it's not all sunshine and rainbows up here either.
It’s… complicated. The US is more like the EU. Every state is practically its own country. Every state has its own health department. State wealth varies greatly and each state has their own opinion on what level of trust should be placed on federal government. The one example we have of federal health care (VA for military veterans) is shit.
Maybe things will change based on the current trajectory… corporate buy outs have been rampant and experienced doctors are retiring to cash in before they can’t afford to run their own practice. It takes weeks to get appointments and most corporate doctors just want to stick to the treatment script they are provided. In other words, corporations are doing exactly what most people fear the feds would do.
Even most developing countries have nationalized healthcare alongside private options.
American healthcare and insurance is only "mildly infuriating" if you've never had to deal with it. If you had, you'd probably characterize it as "goddamn fucking enraging."