Obamacare: The Terrifying Consequences To Healthcare

Wednesday, February 19, 2014
By Paul Martin

Joe Wurzelbacher
TheDailySheeple.com
February 19th, 2014

By Tom DeWeese

As the Obamacare debate rages, we hear much about insurance companies, costs and people’s ability to pay. We hear the policy defended as proponents tell us it will provide healthcare to those who never had it. Of course, these proponents never seem to explain how those who couldn’t afford healthcare when it was a choice can now afford an even more expensive cost now that government mandates it.

However, these debates about the pros and cons of Obamacare basically focus on money. What about the real issue – healthcare? What will Obamacare do to our medical system? How will it affect the quality of our care? How will it affect doctor’s decisions as they attempt to take care of our health needs? And, ultimately, in a system controlled by government bureaucrats and government-written manuals – who will really be making the decisions that determine our quality of life? These are the real questions that need to be the center of the debate. And the answers are terrifying.

I recently received a report from an Oncologist, Dr John Conroy, who is fighting the desperate battle to treat cancer. All of those concerned Americans who wear their pink ribbons and dash for miles in their stop-cancer marathons should take a long hard look at what Dr. Conroy reports to be the future of all American medicine. They may want to start running straight at Congress to save their own lives.

Obviously, Oncology is a very detailed science, difficult for the layman to understand. That’s why American healthcare has always promoted specialists. Let’s begin with a patient who has discovered a lump on her breast. She takes a mammogram, undergoes a biopsy and is found to have adenocarcinoma. She is seen by an Oncologist and certain questions need to be addressed.

As Dr. Conroy explains the process, first, doctors must determine the “Stage” or extent of the disease. The most common system for determining classification of malignant tumors and the extent of a person’s cancer is called the TNM system. “T” measures the size of the tumor and if it’s invaded nearby tissue. “N” determines regional lymph nodes that are involved. “M” measures the distance the cancer has spread from one part of the body to another. These measurements are critical in determining how sick the patient may be.

In fact, there are four stages, classified under the TNM system, with multiple possible results determined by a large variable of TNM data. With an adenocarcinoma cell type under the microscope, there are about 40 pathological (histology) types which could lead to as many as 36,000 possible variable combinations of the cancer. The grade or aggressiveness of the cancer is 10 grades. So, 10×36,000 = 360,000 possibilities. Next, hormone sensitive status = 8 possibilities. So, 360,000 x 8 = 2,880,000 and menopausal status = 5,760,000 possible computer input combinations. These are the possible combinations on just one page of data in staging. So the computer system has to evaluate these combinations.

Whew! That’s a lot of data to determine how sick a patient may be, with what kind of cancer, at what stage. It’s all necessary data to determine the most effective course for treatment. Again, that’s why we have specialists who focus entirely on certain diseases and other maladies that affect our bodies. No one individual could possibly be knowledgeable in all aspects of the human body.

But now, with the growing control by government over health care decisions, things are changing. Over the past several years, a growing number of bureaucrats from insurance companies have been armed with manuals, guidebooks and calculators to step in to the decision making process to decide what treatment procedures are allowed. And it’s going to get far worse under Obamacare, as a new layer of government bureaucrats is added to affect what doctors can do to save your life.

As Dr. Conroy explains, to look into the body and make a determination on where to start planning treatment, he uses x-rays and cat- scans (c-ts). “I generally cat-scan head to toe and look for metastasis and get a baseline.” However, such decisions for care by the doctors are now being decided by others. Says Dr. Conroy, “In the past, it was ok (to X-Ray and CT), not now. Over the last few years all the X-rays have to be approved, so there are companies now that have algorithms to evaluate your request (for a cat-scan or X- ray).” He explains that these companies, which work in partnership with hospitals and insurance companies, “process thousands of requests a day. “ They decide who gets to use the machines for what purposes. “So,” he explains, “if there’s no headache, then there is no cat-scan of the brain. If a normal chest x- ray is taken, then no cat-scan of the chest.”

Here’s where these rules and regulations start to really get scary. If he, as the doctor, wants to challenge the decision by the company as to whether he can get both a cat-scan and X-Ray, he will call them to do so. “I have to discuss this with the ‘medical director’ who will say yes — if I use certain ‘key’ words” Or the medical director will say “no,” the procedure does not fit the guidelines. Without having the medical background of the doctor or all of the data he has been trained to read, the company medical director can make the call – all based on a manual written to one size fits all!

Meanwhile, the doctor is responsible for the health of his patient, tasked with the job of making the right decision as he is forced to move forward blindly. He’s unable to get the complete information he needs to make an educated evaluation, because a bureaucrat rejected his request for the proper testing. Yet, if the doctor makes the wrong decision and the patient suffers or dies, he is liable for legal action by the patient’s family. He has no legal protection if he missed a lesion in the brain. Says Dr. Conroy, “I am liable, let alone the damage to patient.”

How “Red Tape” Strangles Treatment

The Rest…HERE

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