Health Care and Donald Berwick... It's Coming and You Were Warned

I will make an earnest effort to stop blogging about politics for the next few weeks but so much has happened that I have just had to comment. This is going to be short because I have gone over this ad nauseum in past blogs. We are facing health care rationing. I'm not talking about when your insurance company gives you a list of the Doctors that are on your specific plan or when you have to call and pre-cert a major test or procedure(by the way I have NEVER been denied any procedure that my doctor wanted me to have.) I am talking about real honest to God rationing like they have in England. King Barack has appointed Donald Berwick as the Head of Medicaid and Medicare services. Well, you may think, this has nothing to do with me because I have Aetna, Blue Cross or whatever insurance coverage. Get real. This man will affect the way that ALL insurance companies will function because where medicaid and medicare go the others have to follow. I have mega complaints about the corruption within the medicaid system. For instance just last week we had a patient come in with Blue Max(good coverage) and a medicaid card. This is not a rarity, it happens all the time. I have also questioned why a 98 year old nursing home resident that is ravaged by disease, bed sores, contractions,and Alzheimer's is being rigorously treated for his or her heart attack. I feel that we need a huge over haul but this man will impact us in our choices and the length of time that we get care for treatable diseases. I want to be able to choose what I want done when I am 98 even though my insurance wants to just let me go or worse yet euthanize me(you think this is far fetched...it's coming. I promise you that is on the horizon). I do not want the government involved in my choices or my health. I want them to deal with the corruption only. Medicaid and Medicare are the governments babies they need to police their own agencies before they try to save money by delaying or denying care.