03/17/2021    Peter J. Bregman, DPM

There Needs to be a Health Insurance Revolution

I have been telling all of my patients for the
last few years that unless there is some sort of
revolution or revolt against the so-called health
insurance companies both doctors and patients
will continue to get abused financially. Every
year, premiums go up, co-pays go up and doctors
often get paid less for doing more. The insurance
companies keep increasing their revenues.
UnitedHealthcare made about $15 billion in
revenue. I now refer to insurance companies as
money transferring entities. They take money from
people and then keep most of it, and then give a
little bit to the healthcare providers who
actually help people.

The reason they get away with it is because no
one is making it a big enough public issue. This
is likely because of lobbyists. If we were to
have a revolution similar to what just happened
in our country regarding healthcare, I think
things would change. People need to know how much
money these companies are generating for doing
next to nothing other than shifting around money
and adding bureaucracy to the system. Commercials
with pictures of the board of directors of these
insurance companies showing how many millions of
dollars they make per year next to pictures of
people who can’t afford their $80 co-pay for
prescriptions or being told we can’t do your
surgery because the hospital refuses to except
the $800 for the surgery when the implants cost
$2,000.

The most glaring of all of these examples is
getting paid 50% to do the same procedure on the
opposite foot during a surgery. Ultimately, this
saves the insurance company a lot of money by not
having to do it a second time for a separate
surgery. We should be paid double for doing the
harder work and spending more time. There needs
to be a revolution.

Peter J. Bregman, DPM, Las Vegas, NV

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