Canada Values Health - Dialogue on Health Care -

Cracking down on health care waste

2009-03-13 12:55:25

This topic was suggested by a canadavalueshealth.ca visitor.

Our medical system will continue to get worse if we do not solve the problem of waste. It seems everyone knows that there are millions of counterfeit cards in circulation, which are being used by non-Canadian family relatives or friends that visit only to take advantage of our health care. Add to that the insane practise of so called Canadians that live in their original homeland and return to

Canada only to obtain high cost operations or services and then return to their birthplace. I believe this waste is so large that the dollar numbers are unknown.

Your responses
Waste echotech Posted: 2009-06-26 10:00:53 Why not make it mandatory to present an ID when using your Health cards, very simple solution to the fraud. There is so much waste. I work at a diagnostic facility, we do repeat studies on patients who had the same study a week or two or a month before. Solely because the specialist didn't get to read the first study and thus get to charge for it. And what about family doctors ordering all kinds of tests that the specialist wouldn't order. Unnecessary tests are done all the time! Having everything online would help.
Hosptal Staff inefficient athlon866 Posted: 2009-06-21 09:01:01 I went to a hospital in York Region, ON for after hour medical help. While waiting, I have seen RN and other staff chit-chatting, talking, laughing. I have witnessed it took 3 staff who were doing registering patients 10 minutes to change shifts with other 3 staffs. I just couldn't believe nurse's wage have been raised again and again for many ligitimate reasons, and we are not getting the service. There were lots of patients waiting.
Cracking Down on Unnecessary Use of the Health Care System Alice Posted: 2009-06-10 13:53:20 Not sure how you can crack down on this except to warn patients that each time they visit a doctor or hospital they are at threat of catching something worse than they already have. I myself caught a bad flu that way once. But how do you determine unnecessary use? If a mother suffers from terrible anxiety when her child gets a runny nose, would you kick her out and tell her her visit was unnecessary? This would open up a whole can of worms and we would probably have to pay billions of dollars to more and more administrators to figure out what was necessary and what was not and of course they would get nowhere. If someone is using the health care system unnecessarily, especially if their doctor feels it's too often, perhaps the patient should be referred to psychologists who can deal with the problem once and for all. No need to explain why, necessarily. Then again, psychologists aren't covered by the medical system are they?
Control the threat of lawsuits and you will control over ordering of tests,treatment been there seen it Posted: 2009-05-21 17:39:33 We need to find a way to stop the cover-your- ass practise of medicine. The large number of tests and recheck tests ordered is ridiculous and wasteful and does nothing to improve outcomes. The only way it will stop if the threat of lawsuits are controlled. Physicians should be compelled to participate in a organized peer and healthcare worker review system to weed out the incompentent docs and in return have protection against lawsuits. Bad docs would be detected before the major screwups and good docs can practise good reasonable medicine without the fear of lawsuits in an enviroment of monitored performance. It could reduce costs by 25%
Private sector, government regulated, health care Art Campbell Posted: 2009-04-12 10:36:41 Private health care, regulated by government, would stop this practice. See "Dissed in America", the second topic. See a proposal which takes care of the poor by giving them access to the privately run system.
LIMIT GOVERNMENT EXPENDITURE ON HEALTH TO NO MORE THAN PRESENT PERCENTAGE OF GROSS NATIONAL PRODUCT Eric Odell Posted: 2009-03-27 12:48:41 We cannot afford to increase health care expenditures at the cost of other essential government services. If politicians, health care providers, and all Canadians are prepared to be open to practical ways to maintain and improve our health care system, more can be achieved well within present levels of expenditure. Wasteful practices and regulations need to give way to pragmatic solutions. SUSTAIN UNIVERSAL HEALTH CARE BUT LEAVE ROOM FOR PRIVATE CHOICE. The Canada Health Act, and the interpretation thereof, must be amended to allow the tax-paying public the same right of access to alternate private medical facilities as presently enjoyed by incarcerated criminals, sport jocks, and others. If access to public facilities and health care professionals is speedy, this right is not likely to be utilized. But if access is delayed, then those opting to seek private facilities in fact speed up access to public facilities for others. It is time the ideologues recognized and accepted the fact that a considerable portion of the health budget is paid to private parties already, i.e.; laboratories, radiological clinics, and physicians themselves, most of who are private contractors.
costs to medical f.woods Posted: 2009-03-17 20:13:03 I feel we should have picture medical card like our b.c.i.d This would prevent passing our medical number to out of town visitors to visit clinics or emergency as they have no pre knowledge of who actually owns that medical number. It would stop some of the cheating that goes on with our medical.
Use of Canadian Health Care by ineligible persons EH Posted: 2009-03-16 16:00:55 Add to the examples of persons utilizing the Canadian Health Care system the practice of "family reunification" where oftern elderly relatives are brought to Canada, then after a year being eligible for ongoing and often expensive care. These people have not paid taxes to support Canada. How often to "sponsors" not even meet their obligations to cover costs during the first year of residence?
Value for MONEY atbeat Posted: 2009-03-14 06:30:17 We have this site to discuss issues about health and cost issues for Canadians. Is this paper '52 pages of mostly colored graphics with difficult to read section" really a Value for MONEY? I strongly feel that first the organizers and others involved in this project need to know What a waste is? How much money is spent in developing this 52 page document?
Health tourism bneuwelt Posted: 2009-03-14 04:39:36 People from Canada are also going to other countries where they can pay a small amount to get operations and procedures more quickly than in Canada. "Health tourism" is a growing industry. It takes local resources away from health care for local people, often in poorer countries who can little afford it. In Ontario, we at least have a rule that you have to live in Ontario for 6 months of the year in order to access health care. It's difficult to see how people can come home just for an operation, except as you point out, through health card fraud.