Of course, the question remains as to whether or not a public option would actually cause private health insurance premiums to rise more quickly than they already do.  David Williams believes that it would not, and has detailed several reasons for this in his article, which is well worth reading.

I found David’s article in Grand Rounds, hosted this week at Non-Clinical Jobs.

The lowest estimate for the cost of his care, which includes two rounds of chemotherapy treatments and surgery, is $300,000. Even one week in a hospital can cost thousands of dollars, Liu said.

Only one problem.

His student health plan has a $50,000 limit.

Rick’s comment makes a good point:

The biggest issuer of student health plans: MEGA Life & Health. ‘Nuff said.

These plans (even the ones not issued through MEGA Life & Health) offer the same misleading general information that most people don’t look much beyond – a low deductible, 80/20 coinsurance, copays for doctors visits and Rx, and even maternity coverage. Check out the plan information for Colorado State University (CSU) and Colorado University (CU).

In January of 2007, my parents were able to join a pilot program at the University of Colorado Hospital that was working to get patients set up on a home hemodialysis system. They took a three week training course where they learned all the ins and outs of the machine and my mother learned how to insert the needles and prepare for possible problems that could arise during treatment. They plumbed the dialysis machine into their house, and have been using it six days a week for the last 13 months. My father has felt better in the last year than he ever felt in the previous six years. His blood pressure is normal again. He hasn’t vomited since last May (before switching to home dialysis, it wasn’t uncommon for him to vomit daily). He and my mother are remodeling an old house they bought last summer, and he has the energy to work on it several days each week. When I’m around him now, I often forget that he’s sick, whereas before he started the daily home dialysis, it was pretty hard to miss.

Once a month my parents go to the University of Colorado Hospital for testing to make sure that my father’s treatment is working. The doctors also run additional tests for the study that my father is part of, to determine whether daily home dialysis results in better patient outcome than trice-weekly clinic dialysis. Medicare is the primary health insurance for the vast majority of dialysis patients, and they are very interested in large-scale studies to determine whether daily home dialysis should be the recommended treatment for more patients.

From my family’s experience, we would absolutely say that the daily dialysis is dramatically superior. But it does require a caregiver – in this case my mother – who can operate the system and assist with the dialysis process. So it might not work for everyone. But for the majority of patients with kidney failure, daily dialysis can make life seem much more normal than the standard protocol of going to a clinic three times a week and then riding the roller coaster of peaks and troughs in toxin and fluid levels that accumulate over two days. I’m very thankful that my parents were able to enroll in the University of Colorado Hospital program, and that the home dialysis is working so well for my father. I hope that this option will become available for more kidney patients, and will be reimbursed by Medicare for anyone who wants to participate.

What this means

For cost-conscious Small Group employers, there’s bound to be an HMOSelect plan that fits their unique needs. These employers can make the most of their health care dollars, while their employees have access to community-based physicians and other providers where they live and work.

Smaller network = greater savings

Your costs may be up to 20 percent lower than Anthem’s traditional HMO health insurance plan costs when you choose an HMOSelect plan to offer your employees. That’s because the network is smaller than with Anthem’s statewide HMO Colorado network. But smaller doesn’t mean they’ve sacrificed quality in our network.

Members have more choice from a select network

The expanded HMOSelect network now includes 14 facilities, which are listed below, and more than 5,000 physicians in the following Colorado counties: Adams, Arapahoe, Boulder , Broomfield , Denver , Douglas, Elbert, El Paso , Jefferson and Teller. That’s two out of three HMO Colorado providers in this 10-county area who participate in the HMOSelect network.

Members can only use providers in Anthem’s Colorado HMOSelect network, which includes Centura Health facilities and physicians and several other facilities in the three-county Colorado Springs area and seven-county Denver metro area. Except for emergency care, services obtained from providers outside the HMOSelect network aren’t covered.

Colorado Springs area HMO Select facilities

• Penrose facilities
• Penrose Hospital
• Penrose Community Hospital
• St. Francis Health Center

Denver metro area HMOSelect facilities

• Centura facilities
• Avista Adventist Hospital
• Littleton Adventist Hospital
• Parker Adventist Hospital
• Porter Adventist Hospital
• St. Anthony Central Hospital
• St. Anthony North Hospital

Other facilities

• The Children’s Hospital
• Craig Hospital
• Denver Health Medical Center
• National Jewish Medical and Research Center
• University of Colorado Hospital

tags: colorado blue cross health insurance

“Heart attack hospitalizations did not change significantly for residents of surrounding Pueblo County or in the comparison city of Colorado Springs, neither of which have non-smoking ordinances,” said the American Heart Association, which published the study in its journal circulation.

The association said this was further evidence of the damage wrought by secondhand smoke.

“The decline in the number of heart attack hospitalizations within the first year and a half after the non-smoking ban that was observed in this study is most likely due to a decrease in the effect of secondhand smoke as a triggering factor for heart attacks,” it said.

It said the researchers had taken into account other variables such as air pollution and community-wide changes in preventive care and concluded that they did not have an impact on their findings.

Working-class Pueblo has a higher percentage of smokers — 22.6 percent — than the statewide Colorado average of 18.6 percent.

“Adopting a non-smoking ordinance has the potential to rapidly improve the cardiovascular health of a community,” Bartecchi said in a statement.

Colorado enacted a statewide smoking ban in July. The Pueblo study gives a positive outlook to the future of healthcare in Colorado. A 27 percent decrease is substantial and will cut the cost of treatment with a trickle down effect to the cost of health insurance throughout the entire state.