Yes, I survived Irma. All is well.

Oh, good. :)

Hopefully the U.S. is out of the path of any more hurricanes for a very long time, but somehow I don't feel optimistic.

The junkie Trumpbart Republicans are on Medicaid.

Sad but largely true, particularly with Medicaid expansion in many states under the ACA/Obamacare. How fortunate for the "Trumpbarts" that there are enough Democrats and just enough Republicans in the Senate in order to stop "their voice"... also known as BLOTUS... from throwing them under the bus in order to provide himself with a huge tax cut via abolishing the Alternative Minimum Tax. Who knew healthcare was so complicated?

I do hope tax cuts are equally complicated because if "their voice" endeavors to do away with the AMT and slash corporate taxes at the expense of the middle class, shame on them: NOPe... Not One Penny!

It's high time the vast majority of Americans stopped getting trickled down on.

Depends on the patient's preference these days as people change doctors as they move or become dissatisfied or whatever. But, there are many who have been with their 'family' doctors for a very long time, until the doctor retires.

However, in many places, it's not that easy to find a new doctor who is accepting new 'patients'.

Of course, all of our medical records are pretty much all on computer now so that eliminates a lot of issues like you describe when patient history is not readily at hand.

Corporate doctors - that's a new term for me, haven't heard of it before and I guess that is a feature of the kind of system you have down there that would presumably and inevitably change when you switch over to single payer.

This getting very rare in the US, as private practices are being replaced by larger corporate practices. My doc went corporate (his practice was bought out) about 10 years ago. Every year gets a bit more corporate. For the last three years I've endured a lot of unnecessary procedures because the practitioner on call for a non-routine visit doesn't understand my medical history like my long term doc does. My medical history is never flagged to alert them about it, and the triage team never pays any attention to my heads up anyway. Insurance covers most of the waste, which is passed on to me and Medicare.

Yes, I survived Irma. All is well. The storm started hitting here in Tallahassee in earnest between 4 and 5 am Monday morning. We lost power sometime after that before daybreak. Power was just restored around 3:30 am this Tuesday morning. So we were without not quite about 24 hours. Winds here were about 60 miles an hour like I thought. We just hunkered down in place and rode it out. Basically just a tropical storm. Live Oak, Lake City, and points east like Jacksonville got hit worse than we did. It wasn't even as bad here as Hermine was last year. Unlike south Florida, we here in the north seemed to have dodged the bullet for the most part.

Thanks to all who expressed their concern. It was much appreciated.

Put a $1500 suit on this Simpson character and you basically get the Kush.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mBec9vGdjEU

"Well, that's good news"

In roughly the same sense that The Black Death in 14th Century England dramatically increased the wages of surviving agricultural laborers. :) No pain, no gain.

Do Canadian primary care physicians establish a long history with individual patients? This getting very rare in the US, as private practices are being replaced by larger corporate practices. My doc went corporate (his practice was bought out) about 10 years ago. Every year gets a bit more corporate. For the last three years I've endured a lot of unnecessary procedures because the practitioner on call for a non-routine visit doesn't understand my medical history like my long term doc does. My medical history is never flagged to alert them about it, and the triage team never pays any attention to my heads up anyway. Insurance covers most of the waste, which is passed on to me and Medicare.

Fifteen yrs ago I would have agreed with you. Fewer companies are offering the benefit to their employees and when they do, the cost subsidy is less and less.

The whole notion of getting health insurance through your employer is a vestige of Second World War price and wage controls.

An excellent thumbnail history of US health care:

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=114045132

"Are legislators looking into how the rest of the civilized world pays for it?"

How much looking can you do when you spend 50% of your working day on the phone raising money for your next election? Then there is the matter of who you are calling...insurance companies and drug manufactures:marketers are generous when it comes to campaign donations.

I think it fair to say that most legislators have taken a furtive glance at what other countries are doing ...but only when they think nobody is looking...and then they clean the history on their browsers.

You can see the impact of insurance and drug industries on one nifty little site:

https://www.opensecrets.org/

Liz-3

"I don't see any reason why your federal and state governments can't take all of the 'best in class' concepts from other single-payer systems - including your own Medicare - and develop a strategy to move from what you have now to the best single-payer, government-run healthcare system in the world."

Greed and a greed friendly political system.

"How can people live on 13 cents a day???!!!"

"We try not to pry into the private lives of our employees"

-old Bob and Ray paper clip factory routine

Why should the exceptional care about how the unexceptional do their unexceptional stuff?

In any event, it won't be easy to implement a big change like this. But, it's a change that has to be made if cutting costs and providing universal coverage is what Americans want.

Are legislators looking into how the rest of the civilized world pays for it?

The site has been having minor shutdowns today, this is likely due to thunderstorms temporarily knocking out my local ISP. Thunderstorms are a rarity out here, so that's my best guess.

In any case, the interruptions in service seem to be fairly temporary, so just keep trying...

Thanks.

-CW