The Long Island Health Care Survey was released today, a study conducted by Adelphi University, and here’s the gist of it: Though Long Islanders in general are healthier and have better health-care access than most Americans, our local Hispanics, less-educated, low-income and uninsured (big surprise) residents have a harder time finding care … and they’re less healthy because of it.
And while finding a way to improve coverage for low-income families is a challenge facing the entire country, LI Biz Blog wonders how Long Island can reverse the trend. Is our heath-care system to blame? Are employers to blame for paying too little in wages? Are insurance companies to blame for making coverage too expensive and beholden to all sorts of exclusions?
And is this even a local problem? Or do we need national reform first? Let us know.
And here are a few points from the study:
Nearly one in five Long Island residents with household incomes under $40,000 (defined in a 2006 Vital Signs report as the “true poverty” rate) lacked health insurance. By contrast, only 1 percent of those with household incomes of at least $60,000 lacked insurance.
One-fifth of Hispanic residents, 26 percent of residents with household incomes under $20,000, and 17 percent of those with incomes of $49,000 to $60,000 who received health care in the past year reported having major problems covering the costs of necessities, such as rent, food, heat, car fuel, or other transportation costs, due to medical bills.
Fourteen percent of those taking prescription drugs reported rationing their medication use (by splitting pills, skipping doses and not filling prescriptions), and 13 percent reported spending less on basic needs because of prescription drug costs.
More than 90 percent of white and black residents reported having a regular health care provider, compared to only 70 percent of Hispanic residents. In addition, 94 percent of U.S.-born residents reported having a provider, compared to only 60 percent of non-citizens.
Close to half of respondents reported at least one chronic health problem, with greater prevalence among those with lower education and income.
While the region’s overall diabetes rate-7 percent-is on par with the rate for the U.S. a whole, significant differences among populations persist. More than twice as many blacks (16 percent) reported being diagnosed with diabetes as whites and Hispanics (7 percent).
Among those who received care in the past year, one in 10 (9 percent) left a provider’s office without getting important questions answered. The most common reason cited was that the doctor spent too little time with them.
Almost one in ten (8 percent) respondents who visited a health care provider in the last year said that they had experienced some form of discrimination based on factors such as age, sex, socio-economic-status, insurance status, and English proficiency. Hispanics, those with less education, and those with lower incomes reported higher rates of at least one form of discrimination.
In general, respondents reported a high degree of trust in their health care providers but race/ethnic concordance between doctors and patients increased the degree of trust for whites and blacks.
I think you should do another study to find out how much of the Health Care costs go to the Doctors, Clinics, Nurses, Technicians, Pharmaceuticals ecc. who actually deserve to be compensated for their services and how much is going to all the Parasites!
The other problem which concerns the poorest/uninsured is the disparity of prices if one requires medical service and does not have insurance. The price automatically goes into the stratosphere and the Long Island Jewish group is the foremost culprit whom I additionally think should be invastigated by the NYS Attorney General because of it. Look over any LIJ bill and see the List Price of the services and then see how much the combined payment is due from the Insurance Co. and the Patient. While the uninsured pays the List Price at a minimum 300% of what I and my Insurance CO. would pay. I have been tracking them. I give you one example, a cousin of my mother in law who cannot afford Insurance but does not qualify for Medicaid needed some testing and his Doctor send him to the LIJ at Glen Cove telling him it would cost about $ 1,500 a sum that said Individual was resigned and ready to pay. Well, when the “Retail” invoice came it was for a whopping $ 5,400!!!!!!!! Absolutely zero conscience. So the cushioned Patient coupled with the Insurance pay $ 1,500 while the unfortunate and less able to pay get crushed with $ 5,400 for the same service! Some weird notion of fair play.
I am a staunch Conservative Republican but when it comes to Health Care Coverage I say it’s not working and we should throw all these Parasites in the Bay!
I believe that the insurance companies are to blame for the crumbling healthcare system in this country and not the doctors. The average doctor in this country is operating in a system where they cannot do the things they were taught and trained to do because of the health insurance companies.
For example, lets say you go to your doctor and he says,” according to your blood test, you are borderline diabetic. That doesn’t mean you have diabetes but you’re close to having it.” In this scenario, he would tell you to start exercising and eating right. However, the insurance company will not reimburse the doctor because there is no diagnostic code for pre-diabetes. Hence if you don’t have a proper code, you cannot justify treatment. If you cannot justify the reasons behind the treatment, you do not get reimbursed.
This ultimately leads to the doctor telling his pre-diabetic patient (in the example given) that nothing is wrong with him, the patient gets full blown diabetes, and then the doctor can give a proper treatment with a justifiable diagnostic code to get reimbursed. What’s worse is that the medication perscribed is twice the normal dosage than what he is supposed to give. Thus leading to drug resistant diseases or problems regarding the side-effects of the medications.
Health insurance companies must be thrown in the bay never to return!
I must also agree with you on this, some High School left back working for the Insurance Companies are making the decision of what to approve and what not with the mandate to increase Share Holders Income are telling our Professional Doctors what to do. No wonder many Doctors are leaving the profession and becoming “Salesmen”. These “Gatekeepers” are like State or Federal Tax Auditors who are selected intentionally from the dumbest lot to tire taxpayers into submissions with their retardation so we just give up to go back to work!!!!!!! You think I am making it up? Yeap I have dealt numerous times with our wonderful retarded NYS tax auditors…..they couldn’t have possibly scrapped them from any lower mental pit! It has to be intentional just like the gatekeepers at the Health Insurance Industry. And they are all the same shit from a different asshole! HIP, Aetna, Oxford, Cigna just to name a few I have known. Simply same shit different asshole………..