Archive for September, 2011

Secrets Revealed…

Maximize Your Health Care Cost Dollar

You’ve seen these types of headlines on the Internet, TV, Radio or Magazine Tabloids at the Grocery Store checkout register.  Whether they’re addressing Health Care, Weight Loss, Vitamins, Skin Wrinkles, Sex Drive or other issues, it’s always the same form of catch phrase “What They Don’t Want You To Know!”  How ridiculous is that.  If “They” didn’t want you to know, then why would “They” allow it to be revealed?  Especially when the expose’ has to do with promoting something.  Well, I confess, I’ve read some of these articles that “spotlight” health & wellness in many of its forms and have come away with the attitude that 99% of it is not “Breaking News” or should appear under the heading of “Ripley’s Believe It or Not”.

So what’s my headline got to say of importance?  As an Insurance agency, you might guess we offer health insurance coverage.  Now don’t “delete” this message just yet, I’ve got some “Free, No Obligation” information you can use in maximizing your health care cost dollar.

It’s been said that many people commit suicide with the use of a fork, only they either are not aware of it or don’t care.  Just look in people’s shopping cart at the supermarket, or perhaps even yours.  How many items are “hermetically sealed”, contain sugar content that would have you and your kids bouncing off the walls for weeks, has a sodium level far exceeding the “MSG’s” of any oriental dish or a calorie count that would cause the personal use of a weight scale at a truck stop?

If your meal menu and that of your loved ones consists of yelling into the speaker box prior to the drive up window at “Cardiac-R-Us”, you’re on the road to hit the headlines of those we used to know!

The Health Insurance Industry submits its premium rates to each states insurance department for approval.  Those rates are based upon the cost of paying health providers for services and products used, along with an authorized (state approved filing) profit margin.  Let’s face it, if there wasn’t a profit associated with this overall issue than we’d all be at the mercy of scriptures’ “Good Samaritan” or “S.O.L.”.

O.K., “Mystic from the Caverns of Knowledge”, how are we to deal with this condition?  For starters, checkout that scroll that serves as a supermarket receipt comparing the cost of “Meals Ready To Eat”, (MRE’s-your uniformed Vet’s loved these!) against those items that you avoided because they take too long to make.  Even if you’re the “Loneliest Number #1”, a healthy complete meal can be made in (30) minutes that would make any “Hell’s Kitchen Chef” be impressed.  If there’s more mouths to feed at the trough, then have them join in.  After all, it’s written in the “Good Book”, “You don’t eat, if you don’t work”; talk about incentive!  Most of that packaged “time dated” stuff having ingredients that we all have a tough time pronouncing costs more than the “real” sustenance featured in the fruits & vegetable bins; besides, once you pop it into the microwave, its lost most of its’ nutritional value and probably tastes like “hospital food”.

So far, you’ve been exposed to a lot of information.  I’ll end this discourse for now, as I’m sure your attention span is waning; however, up-coming articles will deal with this matter and provide you with some invaluable tools to work with.

Get a head start by accessing a great website to expedite your quest for better health & nutrition:

http://www.skennedyjuiceplus.com/

Medicare Home Healthcare May Soon Carry Charge

Senior Market Advisor Magazine

In contrast to current Medicare policy, the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission has issued a new recommendation that seniors be charged co-payments for home health care visits. The recommendation is designed to reign in the cost of home health care, which currently runs $20 billion per year. To date, seniors have received this type of care free of charge.

The Medicare website stipulates that in order to qualify for home health care, beneficiaries must be referred to the program by their physicians, require skilled nursing care, be approved by the Medicare program and be homebound and unable to leave home without assistance.

While some members of the commission expressed concern over the recommendation’s impact on seniors of modest means, the vote was nevertheless 13 to 1 in favor of passing the recommendation along to lawmakers. Low-income seniors would be exempt from the requirement, as would recently discharged hospital patients.

The co-payment is aimed at discouraging abuse and overuse of the system. “At the extreme, this benefit can turn into a long-term care social support system,” says the congressionally appointed commissions chairman Glenn Hackbarth. “A modest co-payment is one tool to help deal with that problem.”

Furthermore, there is concern that fraud has been creeping into the system, and the commission hopes a co-payment would limit such activity. While the commission did not make any explicit recommendations regarding a co-payment amount, the sum of $150 for a series of related visits has been proposed.

Presently Medicare requires co-payments for many of its services, but until now home health care has been the exception rather than the rule.