Health Care Providers on the Health Care overhaul

Health Providers and the Health Care overhaul

Photo by Michael O’Leary for The Herald
"Family nurse practioner Cheryl LaFlore provides an ear exam for 6-month-old Malyki King-Perez at the Providence Everett Healthcare Clinic."
What can I say?  I just love this picture!  A robust baby just as weirded-out as I am by what it's like to have to go have the doctors work on you to get you back in order.  There are many very detailed stories out there but the photo said a lot to me - how precious a life is, for one (outside of my over-identifying with that wonderful expression).

Sharon Salyer writing for The Herald-Net in Everett, Washington explores health care provider reactions to the new changes coming.

' Parents who get a new job won’t have their kids turned down for health insurance because of an ongoing medical problem.

Young adults, such as those just out of college who often can’t afford to buy individual health insurance plans, can remain on their parent’s plans until they’re 26.

And customers won’t be charged co-payments for preventative care, such as checks for diabetes.

These are some of the changes health care professionals say families will see most quickly from the national health insurance legislation passed by the House of Representatives on Sunday. '

The changes won't take place for at least six months after Obama signs the full bill.

The uninsured will have to wait longer.  The next set of federal health care provisions go into effect in 2014.  Until then the number of people without
health insurance will continue to grow.

An excerpt

' Many people agree on pieces of the legislation, such as whether everyone should have health care, he said. And many agree that insurance companies should not be allowed to dump people because of serious health conditions.

“When you ask people if they want health care reform … there’s thousands of pages in this bill nobody has ever read, written by somebody with a vested interest,” Raney said. '

Read various reactions, at the linked-article, by providers and others affected by the changes.

Oh, from the Comments area - while I can't confirm this is really from the baby's relative, here is what I just saw there:

' This baby is as adorable as is perfect picture implies.
  I am his great grandmother, and thank goodness our system currently assists young families with the health care for their children. But unfortunately his grandmother currently needs surgery. She recently lost her job, now has no health insurance. Needs her gallblader out, and has bleeding that needs addressing with a test prior to surgery.

  They tell her to come back when she has health insurance. They will only help her if her life is in "imminent danger". And without the test to determine the cause, they can't say she is in danger! This is the part of our health care reform that needs fixing NOW, not in four years!
Jenall Brister | Mar 24, 2010 9:51 am '

Others note that some (or much) modification is in order because when you've lost your job and then you need to buy health insurance at a time without income, you might be subsidized when it's determined you qualify -- but where does the rest of the payment come from when jobs are scarce and the NY Times has an article about the people in job lines who will not have a job for several years?  There'll need to be work on this.  What's to be done for the next 4 years before some of this even comes into effect.