Retirement, the Pleasant Final Years

I recently retired and I’m on Medicare, you know, the Government will take care of me now plan – for me having paid into SS for 35 years!

I find that I must now pay (monthly – whether I go to the Doctor or not) for:

1. Medicare (original Medicare)

2. Supplemental Insurance

3. Prescription Coverage – because Medicare and the additional (supplemental) Insurance won’t cover prescriptions.

4. Many Co Payments

5. Bunches of Deductibles

[Co Pay and Deductibles are a cleaver, legalese, terms for saying that YOU PAY, they won’t!]

6. Not to mention, I have to pay for anything else that the Insurance Companies and Medicare won’t cover – which apparently are numerous services and medications!

7. And then there’s that “Doughnut Hole” thing!!!!!!

For example: I recently went to a Doctor – I was in his presence for less than 10 minutes. He gave me some simple “tests” and then sent me to another Doctor. I spent less than 10 minutes with this “Specialist”, too! And, my condition is still not fixed!!!! However, they both want me to come back for more consultations!

Both Doctors legally charged more (almost double) what my Insurance Company and Medicare will pay for. I also had to get (and pay for) prescription drugs that did nothing for my condition. They were "Let's see if this helps" type prescriptions – with co pay.

To add insult to injury I have to use Doctors that are approved by the Insurance Company, and I must also get referrals to go to other (maybe qualified) Doctors! (They must give each other referral fees, or something!)

[I believe that my approved Doctor is actually operating a “referral agency”, to all his friends; it apparently helps spreads the wealth around! I can only guess what he has to do for the Insurance Company to become “authorized”.]

So, after paying for all these Plans and Policies and Prescriptions, etc. - and not even being cured - I still owe them an additional $200.00!

[It might be more palatable if they would have actually fixed my condition, but, I guess it’s difficult (not easy) to diagnose a medical condition in less than 10 minutes. Especially if you have 2 or 3 other Patients receiving help at that same period of time!]

Thanks to our Law Makers (love that term) the Insurance Companies, Doctors and Pharmaceutical Companies are all being legally protected - and guaranteed their profits - while we, on the other hand, can’t even break even – we just pay and pay and pay!

Suggestion:

My suggestion is that our elected officials (law makers) should stop passing laws to help us; we really can’t afford much more of their help!

Having been an engineering consultant for 30 years, I can guarantee you that if I would have tried to charged my clients' hundreds of dollars (just one of my Doctor's charged $351.00) for a ten minute consultation, and to not even fix the problem they paid me to fix, I would have either gone bankrupt or been sued for malpractice. But, I guess the Engineering Profession just isn’t “professional” enough to be protected by Congress and their laws.

If they would really want to help us, our Elected Officials should pass a law requiring Doctors to accept only what the Medicare/Insurance Companies "authorized" payments are, should they want to participate in Medicare. Maybe Doctors should have to itemize their claims to Medicare (actual time spent with Patient)! Hell, maybe even pass a law to prevent Doctors from charging huge fees when they fail to cure a patient! Wouldn’t that be novel, not being rewarded for failure.

Note: I was told by “Political Person” that if I was unhappy with my Doctor’s services I could initiate a law suit against him, maybe even a malpractice law suit. Hmmm, with all the other stuff I’m forced to pay for, how could I afford to pay a Lawyer, too!

A Small Clarification:

A False Sense of Security, Social Security, for your old age!

Okay, now, who are really the Bad Guys?

1. The Doctors for charging so much for so little effort?
2. The Insurance Companies for their high Premiums and many “we do not pay” loop holes?
3. The Pharmaceutical Companies for charging $100.00 for 10¢ pills?
   

Not really, it’s our elected officials and non effective regulatory agencies that are really the bad guys.

Our elected officials, our law makers - having obviously been bought - have essentially created laws that guarantee that most of your Social Security income will go directly to Insurance Companies, Pharmaceutical Companies and Doctors; the system is designed to do this. The little remaining money, left over, will sort of go there, too, through “deductibles”, “co-pays” and the infamous “penalty fees”! Funny how that works out, huh!

My recommendation is that for the next several elections “we the people” should “send a message” to Congress that we really can’t afford any more of their help and protection - by voting for anyone that is not an incumbent! Sure, we may get some inept people in office, but it will (eventually) send a message to Congress that we would prefer “inept” people to “corrupt” people! Ha, how much more "worse off" would we be? Maybe, just maybe, eventually we could get elected officials that are on our side!