A man from Nyköping in eastern Sweden has been denied a power wheelchair despite having had both of his legs amputated as the local health authority remained "uncertain if the impairment was permanent".
http://www.thelocal.se/37678/20111201/#
HUH? :waitasec: Is this what our health care will look like soon?
That IS what our health care looks like
now. See, there the government denied this man a power chair. Here, we have private insurers making those decisions and most, despite our payment to them each month, deny us such "amenities":
Consumer advocates say health insurance companies often write policies in a way that gives them flexibility to deny claims.
"In black and white in that policy it says we will determine what coverage to provide," said Gail Shearer of Consumer's Union. "That doesn't give a lot of power to the consumer. That's one enormous loophole."
Instead they offered the Russells a manual wheelchair, which Liam couldn't manage to use on his own.
http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/TheLaw/insurer-policy-power-wheelchair/story?id=3620365#.Tt0QzFbgynA
Every day, thousands of Americans and their doctors fight with insurers for approval of a drug, a test, or a treatment.
It is a fight almost every American has come to know on one level or another.
What happens when an insurer says a lifesaving treatment is unproven, but a doctor thinks the evidence is there? And a patient's life hangs in the balance?
http://articles.philly.com/2011-09-...cobra-program-insurer-independence-blue-cross
.
Denial of a health claim is the top reason consumers file complaints with state insurance officials.
Of the 3,159 complaints received by the Ohio Department of Insurance last year and through Nov. 22 of this year, 43 percent came from people who were unhappy that their insurer refused to pay a medical bill, according to a Dispatch analysis
http://www.dispatch.com/content/stories/local/2011/12/05/denied-claims-spur-action.html
Today Paul and Maria Van Nocker, along with their five-year-old son Kyler, filed a complaint against Harrisburg-based HealthAmerica insurance company on the grounds that the company breached its obligations and duties when it denied coverage of a potentially life-saving cancer treatment for Kyler.
"The doctors told us that Kyler needed this treatment to save his life, but HealthAmerica said it wouldn't cover it," Paul Van Nocker said. "That is unacceptable. We will use every resource available to get him coverage for this treatment and we won't stop until HealthAmerica does the right thing."
http://www.24-7pressrelease.com/pre...reatment-for-their-fiveyearold-son-136908.php
The difference is, in countries with socialized medical systems, life saving treatment is rarely ever denied. It's the non-life threatening things that sometimes can be more problematic to get, like power chairs. (Note there is a dearth of MSM articles about such denials in Europe or the former British protectorate, but TONS about such denials in the U.S.A.)
Here, we not only don't get the non-life threatening things like power chairs, we also don't get the life-saving ones.
Oh, and by the way? People in Sweden, Canada, Norway, Australia, Holland, New Zealand, France, Germany, Spain, Italy, Denmark - those commie countries? They are allowed to have private insurance as well. So, if they are not happy with the government regulated or funded health insurance that is
free to them, they are able to pad it with private insurance in the event something like this may occur.
But, having extensive family and friends living in Australia, New Zealand, Austria, Holland and Spain, I do not know one who carries private insurance. They gripe at times, but when comparing the systems, I laugh at their complaints when compared to ours. They seem much more satisfied than we are.