WOW!!  I DIDN'T SEE THIS ONE COMING!!

The other day, we got a letter from a medical group we use.  There are two paragraphs that you will find extremely interesting.  Here they are.

"The cost of running such a pulmonary practice, however, is becoming prohibitively expensive because we are forced to perform more and more administrative tasks without reimbursement.  For example, our physicians only prescribe quality and necessary drugs and treatment, but both they and our office staff spend an inordinate amount of time filling out extensive forms and making phone calls to insurance companies to justify the treatment plan.  In addition, insurance companies make many more mistakes on their reimbursement, from 20%-40% of the time, and our staff spends more and more time with them re-billing for their errors.  This was simply not the case several years ago."

There is a lot more, but here is the KICKER!!

"A better alternative is to simply receive a yearly $350 administrative fee from all our patients.  The fee will be billed on May 1 of each year.  This allows us to continue to participate in Medicare and private insurance plans.  Because all administrative costs will be covered, including the charges mentioned above, we will be able to to continue our practices of uninterrupted, excellent medical care."

Wow!!  We see four medical specialty groups a couple of times a year.  If they all adopt this idea, our healthcare costs will go up $1,400 a year for EXACTLY the same service.  If this doesn't make you understand we have to get control of our Healthcare Costs, then I don't know what will!!