Insurance Quote

GaryDidier

I just recieved a quote from MVP for health insurance. It is for 2 adults and one child in college. The quote- $1891.56 a month. I'm chocking. What cos do you use for coverage and what are the costs and deductibles. Also my liability carrier keeps sending new exlusions all the time.The last one said we no longer cover haz. waste spills.What do you think fuel oil is once it is spilled.Talk about overhead! Sorry for ranting.
Gary from Granville

Dave DeFord

Last quote I saw...

for a plan with 80-20 copay with a $ 100 deductible and maximum annual payout by patient of $ 1,100 ran about $750 per month. This did not include prescription, vision or dental coverage. This is about a year old. I also saw a recent COBRA bill from a major employer run about the same including all of the exclusions above. It was a PPO plan with a $15 copay. These were both in Michigan. Your quote seems high so you might want to shop around.

Earthfire_2

Insurance plans

Checkout your local home builders association, Chamber of commerce. The ones in my area all offer group health & workers comp. plans thru the associations.

Robert O'Connor_7

REVOLT!!!!

I say we all REVOLT! If we stuck together, we'd have the country (and the politicians) on there knees. How bout a group plan of all P&H companies. Maybe self insured? Alot of talk about SHAME ON YOU, about P&H companies overcharging. What about Hospitals? See what they charge for an asprin. There are alot of extremly smart P&H people out there, this could work. We can let Mr. H be the administrator.... Robert O'Connor... Remember THE PLUMBER PROTECTS THE HEALTH OF THE NATION

George_10

Not a bad idea

there has got to be a company that would love to grab all of this business. How many companies are represented on just the wall and how many employees. It probably is a large census number which could get great rates for all concerned.

Well at least better than what can be obtained individually.
It could be worth the time and effort to check it out.

Ken_8

Our NJ rates

are just about the same. $800 for parents and a child.

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Mike T., Swampeast MO

Problem isn't going away...

Some may say that the U.S. has the "best" health care in the world but when it really comes down to it, what we seem "best" at regarding such is profit.

Medicine has ALWAYS been a practice with only one certainty--the patient WILL die eventually...

Only since the mid-1950s or so did a patient actually have a better than 50% chance of actually being helped by going to a doctor!!! Unfortunately this seems to have translated into a belief that doctors are now some sort of "guarantee" of help. The doctors blame the lawyers--the lawyers blame the doctors--everyone seems to blame the insurance companies (accountants/actuaries/executives), government (accountants/actuaries) and drug companies (accountants/executives).

Who really is to blame? We the people. Why? Because we sincerely expect too much while wanting to give too little. Many (including me) make lifestyle choices that we KNOW aren't too healthy. I smoke, I drink, I enjoy loud rock & roll, and I avoid seeing doctors unless I have an acute problem. I certainly hope than when/if my vices come to haunt me that I will keep my current thinking and prefer to let God complete his plan without expecting that everyone else should buy me a "new" liver or something like that...

I'm every so slightly tilted towards conservatism and libertarianism so I don't particularly care for a governmental "solutions" to problems. But it honestly seems to me that our government already is much of the problem because we have crafted laws and hold ideals that GUARANTEE inefficiency and the ability of so-called "professionals" to be easily overcome by greed that they are allowed to legally disguise as compassion.

Some ideas to help solve the problem:

1) The idea of "reasonability" has been lost regarding medicine. It IS a practice!!!

2) There is no "right" of everyone to have the most aggressive and expensive health care possible. It simply cannot be done.

3) Government likely will have to provide some level of universal care. Good things to include: pre-natal care; well baby care; routine checkups/screenings suitable to age/sex; accidental injury; acute illness.

4) Private insurance can STILL exist with this but the ability to "cherry pick" the young and healthy while forcing others to be cared for solely at public expense MUST be eliminated. One plan--one age at joining the plan--ONE COST FOR ALL WHO PAY--guaranteed portability between jobs/states/etc! This will put some actuaries out of a job but it will FORCE insurance companies to become more efficient.

Enough ranting.

Billy_3

Boston

I am in Boston and I use Tufts. I don't have any emoployees on the family plan but if I did it would cost $750 a month with a 15 dollar copay for office visit. 50 dollar emergency room copay and 250 if admited and the max you can pay in one year is $2000 in copayments and there is no deductible

[Deleted User]

dont even get me started

let it suffice to say plumbers/hydronicians have to get it right the first time!!!not like doctors,,practice, my butt..then they charge you again when it didn't work...can you get away with that? dont get me going,,,hehe

Robert O'Connor_7

REVOLT!!!

REVOLT!!!!! I currently pay apox. $875 a month for 3 people, with the co-pays. I proably have the best coverage around. I'm pooled with apox. 600 other people in a Horizon BCBS........... This is more than my mortgage.....Robert O'Connor

Al_3

practice

What if we all "practiced our profesion"? Iam expected to be a knowledgeable proffesional that can diagnose a problem on any brand equiptment at any time. C'mon let's stop practicing and do our jobs as true professionals! Just my 2cents.

jerry scharf

I'll sign up for that practice idea

To the people who have this idea that a doctor prcticing is a bad thing: I wouldn't set foot in an office where the doctor was so arrogant as to "know" what was going on. I have gotten a great set of doctors over the last 20 years, and every one of them is willing to look into the interesting ideas that are always coming up. I tell my ENT about some interesting results in aromatherapy, and he asks for referrals to the clinical work. Or the endocronolgist who has some wonderful thoughts on how medicine should be exploiting the placebo effect more than they do. I even have an excellent internal medicine person (no one's a GP anymore.)

I doubt any of us "know" very much, it's how we explore and who we have worked with that makes us better (or not.)

(I'll get off my soapbox now)

jerry

Mark Hunt

USFSB


United States Federation of Small Businesses.

That's who we get our health insurance from.

I pay about $875.00 per month to cover myself, my wife, and our two children. (MVP)

Costs $60 a year to be a member.

You may want to look into it.

Mark H

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Paul Mitchell

Ken

I am in NJ also but we are about the same but word is it is going to go up to 980 or so. Cant stand this insurance game...decent rate for a couple years and then you got to move on or raise deductible etc. You think they all would keep it steady and they would retain customers.

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Paul Mitchell

The big game

As I have said we have to constantly play games. We get a new insurance co. for a year or two. then they are going to raise the rates. Then you have to go looking again. I hate doing this to my wife ands the guys. Gotta find their doctors in the book etc. We were with Blue cross BS but rates went crazy. Went to Guardian health net. good deal for a while. Now we are getting increases and probably ...according to the insurance guy going back to Blue cross....Crazy. We should get all together and form a group and try and get a better deal...BUT WE still will have to go through this bounce around game to keep rates low and now there would be 300 of us trying to see if our doctors are in the new plan.

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Firedragon_4

I go through a group called AIM in MA

any businessman can join it for $100.00 per year. Family plan for 2004 is $1302.56/month for $15.00 OV, $10/20/35 for drugs, $250 for ER and $500.00 for Chiro. My wife is an employee, no kids so it's cheaper to go as two singles at $505.91 each.

This, IMO is THE ISSUE for businessmen for this coming campaign, FACT! I won't go beyond that!

Mike T., Swampeast MO

Practice

Comparing a heating system--ANY heating system--to even the most primitive living organism is like trying to comprehend global weather from measurements taken at only one spot on the planet.

For years I would have an intermittent pain in my neck--just called it "sleeping wrong". One time though it wouldn't quit and became so intense that I had to go to the ER at about 3 a.m. (after a scalding shower and a two-mile walk). The most intense pain imaginable--started under my shoulder blade and went to the tip of my middle finger. The BEST I could do was to keep myself and the pain moving--if I sat still so would the pain.

Dr. looked at my vitals and immediately ordered a shot of morphine. I traced the pain--he came back with an illustration in a book and said I'd just mapped such-and-such nerve exactly. He said it was pinched and I needed to go to a certain neurosurgeon THAT MORNING and beg for an appointment. I left with prescriptions for more pills than I've taken in my life.

Morphine wore off and I drove to the neurosurgeon. As I pulled into his parking lot my right hand went numb. Was getting really scared. Saw the doctor and he prescribed a steroid (Prednisone) saying I should have relief in a couple of days. Five days later I call him saying, "I'm downing my bedtime dose of narcotics with two or three strong scotches but STILL haven't slept. He admitted me to the hospital.

Was given morphine over and over. Still couldn't rest and it still wouldn't quit hurting. They gave me a sleeping pill saying, "I guarantee this will let you rest." Two hours later I'm sitting in a hard, straight-back chair in the nurses station reading a book. Head nurse takes me outside for a smoke--thought that was certainly strange as I'd asked to go out previously and they said "no". Came back to something new in my IV. Was asleep in an hour. Woke next morning feeling perfect. Doctor saw me and told me that I looked "like a new man."

Had a new prescription. An extremely powerful steroid called Decadron--prescribed in a strength larger than stocked by my pharmacy. Called a doctor friend who told me, "Neurosurgeons love that stuff. They pump you full right before doing surgery." Did a bunch of research and found that pinched nerves are fairly common, always excrutiatingly painful and "iffy" when it comes to treatment/recovery. (A pinched nerve is the reason we have the Betty Ford Clinic.) Next step in progression was loss of bowel control, followed by complete spinal blockage below the point--both of which had a good chance of being permanent.

HATED taking that Decadron. I could feel my blood pressure surge and just felt really bizarre--but at least I wasn't hurting much... A day AFTER the prescription ran out I was in my store building. Started feeling "slow". Could hardly get out of the way of my own feet. Had lunch--didn't taste a single thing! Went upstairs to the balcony and looked down. Couldn't tell the difference between the distance between my feet (6') and the ground (15')! Called neurosurgeon. Went there immediately. Was "congratulated" by the nurse who said, "the doctor calls your case 'interesting'". (He's oriental, terse, and exacting.) He told me that I had had a stroke and referred me to a neurologist! By the time I made it to the neurologist I could only say, "I feel like my consciousness is leaving my body." He tested me and said he thought I had steroid psychosis and admitted me to the hospital.

WORST night of my life. Literally felt my mind lift away from my body. Was afraid to go to sleep because I would just "leave" and never return. Low pulse/blood pressure alarms kept going off and nurses would come in to make sure I was still conscious. At breakfast next morning I didn't taste a thing and downed a cup of very hot coffee--didn't feel the warmth until it was half way down my throat! Called my mom crying saying I was going to die. Neurologist had scheduled a brain scan. They HAD to take me in a wheelchair--I could not have made it out of the room on my own, let alone through the hospital.

No stroke--or if so no damage from such--but "just" steroid-induced psychosis. By afternoon I could walk (VERY slowly) and asked to leave the hospital. It took over two weeks for me to feel anywhere near normal and YEARS for me to be able to go down a flight of steps without feeling that I would just "keep on going" through the bottom of the floor.

Certainly some "practice" going on here and I rather suspect I could have sued the neurosurgeon.

Three months later I had surgery--same neurosurgeon who when I asked, "Am I guaranteed another episode?" said, "Yes, and I'm afraid it will be more acute."

After surgery I had constant pain--nothing terrible but certainly annoying. Back of my hand and a few other places remained dead numb. Was told it would likely stay that way.

About three years later I was cleaning a hanging wall fountain on my upper balcony. Pulled out my hand to see it covered with wasps. Wondered, "why aren't they stinging me?" then hit the reality--they were I just couldn't feel it! Counted at least 10 stings. Didn't hurt until the NEXT day--but even then it still wasn't hurting where they stung. Over the next few months the pain continued--it kept moving up my arm in the exact nerve route that I know so well. The most amazing thing was that the feeling RETURNED after the pain progressed past!

Once the pain made its way to a couple inches away from my spine I wrote the neurosurgeon explaining the situation and begging drugs. I was constantly contorting and had a very rough time working and sleeping. Was prescribed a strong narcotic but it still didn't really help unless I got myself so wacked out that I didn't care about the pain...

Pharmacist said to try a hot pepper based cream (Zostrix). It worked. As "control" I twice took the narcotic (along with the cream) and the pain would return!

Had been writing the neurosurgeon all through this episode. He thought I had another pinched nerve and wanted to do another MRI and possibly another surgery. Told him, it's the SAME nerve--I KNOW the route--if it's not right you really expect me to let you operate again?

Once the pain made its way to my spine--it quit--and it hasn't returned IN THE LEAST. I had been in constant pain of varying intensity since the surgery but it remains (almost two years now) completely absent. AND the feeling has returned in my hand and the other "islands" of numbness. Neurosurgeon is at a loss for explanation, but seems to conceed that the wasps did something...

Medicine IS a practice!

Mad Dog

Its criminal what the insurance companies are doing

to all of us. $1800 is nuts, keep looking. Yep, liablity and comp keep going up, AND WE HAVE NEVER HAD A CLAIM FOR EITHER!!!!!! Whether you flat rate or T & M, the cost of doing business is a killer. Do you belong to PHCC or anything? We are in a safety group for comp that saves us a few bucks. Mad Dog

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Mad Dog

Sounds good

hey Mark Can you bring me their lit. with you? What is the actual insurance carrier (Blue Cross, Oxford?) are there choices. Mad Dog

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Earthfire

Bee sting therapy

Bee stings have been used as therapy for various ailments.