Long lines at urgent care raise questions on the future of kids’ health.
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It wasn’t long ago that I took part in a HMO plan for my family’s healthcare needs. Going from the 80/20 plans of yesteryear to a HMO was a blessing for parents who had regular visits to the doctor for their children. Though we knew of all of the pitfalls or shortcomings of HMO’s and what the naysayers had to say about them, when it came down to the cash sense of it all, knowing your deductible was set helped a lot of people. Preventive appointments being covered in full most times seemed to be an incentive by itself to be proactive rather reactive when it came to our children’s health.
As we move forward and more companies are working towards implementing high deductible health plans, it is becoming concerning on how this will affect families as a whole. Having a child with some special health concerns, I have felt the impact of these plans first hand. Deductibles as high as $2500 to $5000 out of pocket before the insurance picks up anything is nothing to sneeze at for families. For single parents such as myself, it is daunting when the new year rolls around and you think “here we go again.” The explanations companies and plan administrators offer will come across as sensible if you complain. After all, “in the long run this is better for you” right? And with the Affordable Care Act, there are more people projected to take care of their health, so we should be in good shape as a nation right? This is certainly not what seems to be going on and I can attest to it.
An article last year in USA Today that sparked additional reports from CNBC noted the plans are crippling the middle class and people are going to the doctor less because they can’t afford the high deductibles . Fortunately, there are many who previously didn’t have insurance, who can now get it affordably based on their income but where is the balance?
In the past week, my kids were both sick after hours which caused me to go to urgent care instead of to their regular doctor. A 4 hour wait for a 10 minute visit with the doctor the first time and a 2 1/2 hour wait the second time kept me wondering what was happening with our health systems. Then it dawned on me. It wasn’t the health system that was the problem, but instead the insurance dilemma. While registering for the first visit, the intake clerk politely informed me there were 25 children in front of us so I needed to be prepared to sit for a while. The way she said it was almost as if it was a deterrent so that I would leave if we “really” didn’t need to be there. Looking around at all of the children, I saw everything from face masks to crying children and stressed out parents. As I stood waiting to get my insurance logged in I could hear people complaining “look at us, we aren’t working every day to be treated like this.” These parents were frustrated because of jobs they couldn’t take time off to go to their primary doctor because they needed money to take care of their sick children and pay the high deductibles. A few parents mentioned they had waited as long as they could to bring their kids in which probably unintentionally contributed to the level of illness the kids had. One mom even had her own ibuprofen for her child because she didn’t want to be charged for that by the facility because she hadn’t met her deductible yet and was trying to keep cost down.
What is happening here? It’s no secret, kids get sick. They go to school and they are around other kids so it is inevitable they will catch something. The sad part is when you are in a position where you put off a child’s healthcare because you need to eat or pay for housing so you make a tough choice. How will this play out? What will happen to the state of our children’s health? Will we see more emergency visits because kids are at risk or people can’t afford to handle their regular physician bills? Will people who previously went to the doctor without hesitation to get their kids seen begin using places like urgent care and emergency rooms like a doctor to avoid being turned away?
I’m not sure what the future holds; but, I do know seeing all of those families with all of those children suffering was heartbreaking. Waiting 4 hours was terrible for me and my child who was sick and then exposed to other kids that had some serious health concerns. Seeing three kids having to be transported to a hospital facility by ambulance because the urgent care couldn’t handle them was beyond sad as parents riddled with guilt wished they’d done something sooner.
The state of healthcare is and has been concerning for quite some time. What will it take for us to get something that makes more sense for our families? Some want to blame the Affordable Care Act for causing this, however, if you do some research, you’ll see many companies were moving to this quite a while ago. So, how many more children will have to “wait” because parents simply can’t afford the deductibles before we wake up and do something better for our children and families of all income levels?
Photo: Flickr/Brett Neilson
It makes me glad tthat I live in the UK and don’t have to worry about health insurance etc! The NHS isn’t perfect (far from perfect in fact) but at least I can say that my healthcare is a right that I am entitled to rather than a privilige that I can afford. Under the NHS poor people have as much right to healthcare as rich people. If you CAN afford to ‘go private’ and get better healthcare from a private health insurer, then you are free to do so. But nobody is ever left with no access to any… Read more »
Hey there Dean. I can’t say I disagree with you. You go to any waiting room in an emergency sector and it is always full of sick people just waiting upon hours to see a doctor. I once saw a young girl miscarrying waiting on a chair in excruciating pain while a Chinese food delivery was coming right through the front doors for the Doctors lunch. It honestly made me wanna kill someone
Australia has the same issues here and the way it’s going it won’t be long before the whole system is similar to Americas ailing health system. Labor introduced Medicare to give free medical to all Australian families regardless of income size or means testing and the Liberals are forever trying to tear it apart. When will Governments realise there is nothing more important than health and you just can’t put a price on it
Waiting for the doctor whether you are a kid or an adult is pathetic and the costs of your healthcare still does not cover everything and comes out of your pocket.