Covid19 PSA

Why does a hospital get paid because someone died there?

 

Dungeon bait right thar...

 

Medicaire patient reimbursement from the govt.

 

That seems like a very counterintuitive reward system! How much for someone who recovers?

 

OK, so it's not all patients?

 

What? The Hospital gets paid by the gooberment if someone dies there? You're shitting me, right?

 

ITS MEDICARE REIMBURSEMENT. I THINK THATS THE WAY AMERICAN MEDICINE FOR RETIRED PEOPLE WORKS YO.

 

And I think they get $13,000 if they can call them sick enough to need a ventilator.

 

On that, I'm gonna say but I doubt that too many people allow themselves to get intubated if it's not needed.

 

My take on reading the aforementioned USA Today article is that Medicare pays the hospital $5k for treating garden variety pneumonia. It pays $13k if the patient has to go on a ventilator. It pays $39k if the hospital claims that it could be COVID-19. If that's so it's a no brainer that there is a strong incentive for hospitals to say "could be," especially if it doesn't have to get verified.

I'm not accusing anyone of doing it but if that's how it really works I'd find it hard to believe nobody is doing it. $26k for simply adding the words "Possible COVID-19" to a medical report?

 

About a week and a half ago my uncle died from a brain aneurysm in Bismarck. He was 72 (Dad's brother). ABSOLUTELY NOTHING COVID 19 related.
I haven't talked to him since 2002, so the impact in my little view of the world is minimal at best.

He was on a ventilator, no brain activity....he lingered in that ventilator for four days generating a bill so the fucking hospital could wait for the results of
a COVID19 test. Completely stupid.

Now, that being said, part of it may have been so that his wife and kids could "say goodbye". The hospital had to apparently know there was no COVID19 risk
involved in letting them in the hospital and in the room to let them have their moment...but that's one fucking expensive moment. Five minutes after shutting the ventilator off,
done. Again....no brain activity..completely stupid to have the body artificially maintain any machine provided vital signs at that point. Just let it go.

Then, his wife wants to keep the corpse in cold storage until the Governor reopens North Dakota so they can have a funeral for all the people that knew him.
Do you know that could be an indefinite end wait, and keeping 200 pounds of corpse preserved in the morgue just cannot be cheap. Mind you, these people do NOT have a
a lot of money.....so wasting it on a wait like this is compounding the stupidity.

But the hospital will get I'd guess about 100K in Medicare money to help cover their costs.

 

Ooops, seems PA has a reporting issue.

https://www.pennlive.com/coronaviru...orning-quarterbacking-coronavirus-deaths.html

 

There was still a service rendered prior to death.

But the hospitals are profit centres, if they can find a way to make a better buck off of Uncle Sam, they'll do it.....

 

Winner winner chicken dinner! I've talked to docs who fudge numbers so they can bill the higher amount. ER doc said that if a laceration is <3cm it bills a much lower amount than > 3cm. Guess who rounds up by half a centimetre or so?

Where there's money to be made people will make it.

 

Ok, so lets say the numbers in US are significantly inflated by hospitals getting more $$$. I can see that. But what about the rest of the world? Countries like Spain have free healthcare, why the need to over exaggerate the situation?

 

I don't know if COVID deaths are being over reported in US hospitals. However, if the below analysis is accurate, it looks like the opposite may be happening in other countries.

https://www.ft.com/content/6bd88b7d-3386-4543-b2e9-0d5c6fac846c

 

To improve their importance so they can increase their budgets and give everyone raises.

 

So are the numbers over reported or under reported? Seems like you could come to either conclusion depending on what you want to believe.

It's almost like I can't trust the media any more. Consider me outraged.

 

Unlike 2 stroke motorbikes or cats, human beings are imperfect. Expect weird stuff to happen.

 

I think it's safe to assume the numbers are vastly under reported in China.