McMedicine

joanna bujes joanna.bujes at ebay.sun.com
Wed Jun 12 19:40:57 PDT 2002


At 05:01 PM 06/12/2002 -0400, you wrote:
>I know without having to read the New York Times that docs are
>refusing to take Medicare patients because as an under 65 year old on
>Medicare due to disability I've been on the losing end of that stick
>for years.

Right on Marta! And this problem will get way worse. I find it hard to believe that, with the population aging, and needing more care, they're going to keep going in this obscene direction. I mean, older people vote!

I know a couple of doctors who take Medicare. One is a shrink. He spends at least twenty minutes per patient filling out forms...only to be denied payment at least half the time. The other is my GP. He is completely committed to community health care and has been providing wonderful service to Oakland residents for all of his life. (In his youth, he used to be the doctor for the Black Panthers.) Anyway, I was just in his office and read a long article about him and about the ways that he has actually been fined by Medicare ($38,000) for providing lab work in his own office and for ordering tests/procedures that Medicare did not think were needed. It is horrendous.

Joanna



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