Sunday December 2, 2012, 8:19 pm
The drive for profit is what wrong with whole system, profit is evil in all most everything that human do. We all could live on the earth without money an we all would be fine. Just a change in mind set and rethinking how we in act with each other.

Monday December 3, 2012, 12:36 am
I can see why corporate America and their political lapdogs oppose The Affordable Care Act. Consider this:

"The Affordable Care Act Works: Winning the Fight Against Medicare Fraud," available at www.nhcoa.org:

"For the second year in a row, the departments' anti-fraud activities through the Health Care Fraud Prevention and Enforcement Action Team (HEAT) have recovered more than $4 billion. This is thanks to new tools provided through the Affordable Care Act, which include:

Tougher sentences for people who commit health care fraud

Expanding the search for waste, fraud, and abuse to Medicaid, Medicare Advantage, and Medicare Part D programs

Greater information-sharing capabilities between key government agencies, states, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), and law enforcement partners to suspend payments if providers and suppliers are suspected of engaging fraudulent activity.

In addition, the Affordable Care Act also directly helps Medicare beneficiaries by making it easier to detect, prevent, and report Medicare fraud themselves. The Medicare Summary Notices were recently re-designed to be more reader-friendly, which makes it easier for beneficiaries to detect and report discrepancies or errors, which could be a result of fraudulent activity."
................
I wasn't surprised to learn that the Health Care Fraud Prevention and Enforcement Action Team (HEAT) recently requested a small increase to their budget. You'd think it would be granted gladly --considering how effectively they've been cracking down on fraud and recovering large amounts of money. Unfortunately, but not unexpectedly, the Republicans voted against it. Now why would they NOT want Obamacare to be successful?

Monday December 3, 2012, 3:54 am
Has anyone question the fact that if there was no profit, there would be no facility? Maybe the affordable care will fix this, but this is a problem that was originated by the government in the sense that they said hospitals must treat everyone that shows up, but never provided any funding for it.

Monday December 3, 2012, 6:36 am
This is what happens in an immoral, for profit system. If we had what Europe has we would be more healthy. My friends in France never worry about health care. Just for the conservatives - They are not unemployed or foreign. They are working, highly educated French people.

Monday December 3, 2012, 6:54 am
It is so pathetic that hospitals thrive and prosper greatly at the patients (or the patients insurance) expense. And the insurance companies are the next vampires in line to get rich quick off our suffering. Greed Greed, greed!!

Monday December 3, 2012, 7:14 am
Noted

Monday December 3, 2012, 7:35 am
...as a family physician I have always worked to try and keep health care costs down and patients out of the hospital unless absolutely necessary......however, we are constantly asked to see more and more patients with less time, fewer support staff/services in clinic, cultural/societal expectations, etc....furthermore, patients have become increasingly complex with exploding levels of obesity (and the co-morbidities it leads to including HTN, diabetes, heart disease, etc) as well as continued tobacco/ETOH/drug use and mental health issues....

having said this.....I try and see and treat patients compassionately, correctly, safely, and as affordable for all, but hospital systems/administrators have the need to make $$$....

THE SOLUTION, in my little opinion, TAKE PROFIT OUT OF HEALTH CARE ----> UNIVERSAL GOVERNMENT COVERED HEALTH CARE WITHOUT INSURANCE COMPANIES, HOSPITALS, CLINIC SYSTEMS, ETC NEEDING TO MAKE PROFITS.......I am sure this is considered unpatriotic by many, but its not inhumane......

Monday December 3, 2012, 11:27 am
And ironically, medicare patients are often NOT admitted, but held for "observation"- even if it's for days, to reduce the money they have to pay for further care at rehabilitation centers.

Monday December 3, 2012, 1:39 pm
I work in a hospital and I found this story to be horrifying. These people need to pay back the gov't with interest and penalties then go to jail for medicare/medicaid fraud. If there were really any justice, they would be charged with kidnapping for all those unnecessary admissions.

Obama promised that he would pay for his Obamacare by using monies he would make available by "eliminating" medicaid/medicare fraud. I glad to see he's on top of that.

Monday December 3, 2012, 1:50 pm
I've supported a single-payer plan for some time...thought Obama did, too. Ultimately, the best system would be "Medicare For All." Since hospitals became profit-driven, prices have skyrocketed. Our health care should've never been handed over to the insurance companies....decades ago, they had pretty good plans---which have diminished over time while prices rose astronomically and coverage was diminished.
*I'm sorry I'm unable to send a star to Dave C. since I sent one in the past week. Excellent comment, Dave!

Monday December 3, 2012, 2:50 pm
Although I don't have the time to listen to the stilted reporting of Mr. Kroft, there are a couple of facts that I hope that were brought up in this report. Nobody, is turned away from an emergency room -regardless whether they have insurance or not. People who have no insurance use the emergency room as their doctor.
The only hospitals who admit people on government subsidy are those who have beds to fill.

Tuesday December 4, 2012, 3:27 am
Ty Cal for this. I have not watched it yet, I will, but I want to say a few things from what I have read from these comments. I have worked in the medical field since I was a teenager. I was lucky in the fact I worked at a place that I seen nothing but the best care for patients from the caregivers of the hospital. The doctors I worked for were there for the patients. Over the years the increase in patient load skyrocketed demanding more from what little staff a hospital has. It's hard sometimes to give a diagnosis with little time. I am speaking generally of the EMERGENCY ROOM here. I believe healthcare should be something everyone is able to receive outside the ER. Healthcare shouldn't be something used for huge profits and nothing more. I think a lot of times the doctors and staff are under so much pressure with the candle burning at both ends. Heath care shouldn't be BIG BUSINESS, if they took huge profits out of the mix I think some NOT all, some things would really change. ERs have become doctors offices for the uninsured and that puts great risk to patients that really have health EMERGENCIES. I feel that this is one of the biggest problems.Treating a patient for a simple thing in the ER that could have been taken up with a family doctor takes time away from life and death emergencies in the next room. I'm not saying that this is the only problem with healthcare by all means, but doctors hands are tied when they have so little time to give direct patient care. I'm sure there is different situations depending on the hospital. Fraud is a huge problem but I feel that comes from the business side not always the doctors side. Fraud happens a lot more as well from the other side being the patient. How can an emergency room doctor who has 30 patients figure out in 15 minutes which patient is using someone else's medical care, or this patient complaining of major pain but nothing is found on the x-ray, is this an addict just needing a fix, what about the overweight lady in room 1 with chest pain but her BP is normal, do you admit her, of coarse you do. Did she really have a heart condition, maybe not, but that doesn't mean the Doctor admitted her for profits. There is way to much gray in something that should be black and white. This is my opinion of coarse.

Tuesday December 4, 2012, 1:48 pm
How about converting hospitals (back) to Non-Profits?

Tuesday December 4, 2012, 3:46 pm
Noted thank you

Tuesday December 4, 2012, 7:17 pm
Off topic perhaps....guess how much I was billed by the ER department in a hospital for a Tentenus shot after a dog bite? The Dr. did not have to clean or dress the wound because I took care of it at home but he had to "look" at it anyway.....
$978.00

Wednesday December 5, 2012, 8:54 pm
Until the US embraces universal healthcare, as most other democratic nations have, individuals will be crushed by debt and the country as a whole will be held back. Health care deserves the same support as education.

Thursday December 6, 2012, 7:31 am
Only the tip of the iceberg ... stay tuned (and bring your barf bagO.

Thursday December 6, 2012, 5:44 pm
Very eye opening video. Doesn't surprise me one bit though. It's all about profits with these money-hungry for-profit corporations. We need a single payer health care system here in the US....Medicare for all would be an excellent start.

Sunday December 9, 2012, 2:01 pm
Since ObamaCare, as well as Hillery Clinton I got shoved with higher rates! but this is SAD American is going down and I am happy I am not just born to deal with this MESS

Sunday December 9, 2012, 2:02 pm
Not going to fix typos, you guys get my idea and I have been in the hospital it is a MESS