Death By ObamaCare- Cancer Patients Getting Reamed

[NDXUFan]

Before you know it, they are going to come after dialysis patients......  It is time we stand up to these arrogant people, you hear me, Peckham? Stop selling these decent people a bill of goods.  A number of people told me about you and AAKP and how you sold dialysis patients down the river.  It is just all about you, right?  It is all about you and not dialysis patients, what a fraud.


ObamaCare is supposed to be a huge boon for anyone with a pre-existing condition. Count that another promise broken: It’s actually denying care because of pre-existing conditions.
Millions of Americans with cancer and other chronic illnesses will wind up paying more for lifesaving care, if they can get it all.
To keep costs down, the White House designed ObamaCare plans as cut-rate HMOs. The low profit margins have forced insurers to downsize the number of doctors and hospitals in their networks — and to slash what they cover for out-of-network treatment.
So most ObamaCare plans don’t include the vast majority of the best cancer doctors and cancer centers. That’s a huge problem for these patients. As Dr. Scott Gottlieb, a former Medicare official, writes: “Cancer patients often need the help of specialized doctors and cancer institutions that won’t make it into many of these cheapened networks.”
All across the country, leading cancer centers — including New York’s Memorial Sloan Kettering — are excluded by the largest plans. In Washington state, the largest exchange plans exclude world-class cancer care for kids such as the Seattle Cancer Care Alliance. California’s state-of-the-art Cedars-Sinai cancer center isn’t in any ObamaCare plan. Only a few plans include the Mayo Clinic.
And if you want a doctor outside such networks, you’ll generally have to pay the full cost of care.
Many people will get better coverage at a lower cost under ObamaCare (after all, the feds are spending hundreds of billions on it). But most cancer patients will wind up paying more for less.
Take Michael Cerpok, a leukemia survivor in Fountain Hills, Ariz. Right now, his monthly premium is about half his monthly take-home pay. But the ObamaCare law forced his insurer to kill that plan for one that fits the law’s rules.
Now he’ll have to pay more for drugs, and his Mayo Clinic doctor is no longer in his network.
Last year, his treatment bill was more than $350,000, but thanks to insurance his out-of-pocket was only $4,500. Now, to keep his doctor, the one who has kept him alive for seven years, Cerpok will have to pay $26,000 out-of-pocket.
ObamaCare also stints on drug coverage, severely limiting the medicines plans cover. Many pre-Obama plans just charged a co-pay of about $50-70 a month for cancer drugs. Under ObamaCare, thousands of cancer patients will have to pay more than $2,500 a month for medicines.
Horribly, ObamaCare is limiting access to new medicines just as a revolution is delivering far better treatments. More than 40 new treatments target the genetic source of tumors, as opposed to older therapies that kill cancer cells after they spread. On average, ObamaCare plans cover only 10 targeted therapies, and insurers don’t have to add new breakthroughs until 2016.
A study by Avalere Health found that up to 90 percent of ObamaCare plans will force cancer patients to cover half the cost of new drugs until they hit the out-of-pocket maximum. By comparison, only 29 percent of non-ObamaCare employer-based plans do so.
Many patients will just give up. Another Avalere study found that people are four times more likely to stop using innovative therapies if they have to pay $500 or more.
South Carolinan Bill Elliott, 50, and a late-stage lung-cancer survivor, is looking at doing just that. He reports that premiums for his family will jump from $150 to $1,500 a month. His doctor isn’t in the ObamaCare network and neither are his medicines, so he’s thinking about stopping altogether, “pay the $95 or whatever fine and I’m just going to let nature take its course,” because he doesn’t want to burden his family.
Forget the Web site and other disasters: The ugliest part of ObamaCare is how it denies life-saving coverage to cancer patients. That isn’t a “glitch”; it’s a cruel and key feature of the law.
Robert Goldberg is vice president of the Center for Medicine in the Public Interest and publisher of valueofinnovation.org.
http://nypost.com/2013/11/12/death-by-obamacare-reform-reams-cancer-patients/ 

Where, Oh where, did you hear this before? 

[Zach]

Before you know it, they are going to come after dialysis patients......  It is time we stand up to these arrogant people, you hear me, Peckham? Stop selling these decent people a bill of goods.  A number of people told me about you and AAKP and how you sold dialysis patients down the river.  It is just all about you, right?  It is all about you and not dialysis patients, what a fraud.

Can you elaborate please.  What did people tell you?
How has Bill Peckham (and AAKP) sold dialysis patients down the river?

[okarol]

First, is this post political, general discussion, news story or off topic? It's all over the place.

Secondly, apparently a reminder of the rules is needed:

Comments that include personal attacks or other inappropriate comments or material are not allowed. You can disagree with another member's opinions and discussions are encouraged, but do not go off-topic and attack the person rather than their opinion.

Your comments regarding one of our members are a direct slur and not allowed, unless you want a ban.

okarol/admin

[Bill Peckham]

This is Mark so before you grab your pitch fork get the rest of the story http://www.factcheck.org/2013/11/the-rest-of-the-story-on-arizona-anecdote/

[Bill Peckham]

And no it's not a slur - I am totally responsible for what has become commonly known as Obamacare but by all rights should be called Peckham Care. It was all me. I wrote the entire Bill and thought this whole approach would be ideal (the AAKP helped with the typing).* I did it. I admit it.

What I underestimated was the Republican desire to get shafted by insurance companies. That has caught me by surprise.


*Credit where credit is due

[willowtreewren]

And no it's not a slur - I am totally responsible for what has become commonly known as Obamacare but by all rights should be called Peckham Care. It was all me. I wrote the entire Bill and thought this whole approach would be ideal (the AAKP helped with the typing).* I did it. I admit it.

What I underestimated was the Republican desire to get shafted by insurance companies. That has caught me by surprise.


*Credit where credit is due

 

You crack me up, Bill!

[jeannea]

I had NO idea you had such power Bill. For your next act, can you create chocolate that doesn't make us fat?

[galvo]

You're my hero, Bill!

[Bambino_Bear]

Go Bill!!!

 

[Bambino_Bear]

I try really hard not to be a negative person.  It is difficult when faced with medical problems.  This website is a wonderful place to get support and talk with people who understand.  I do not understand why anyone would use this message board to fight with people.  Why would you go out of your way to antagonize someone?  Why call people out like that?  Not only are you rude, but the things you say are borderline ridiculous. Please keep your temper tantrums isolated to the political board so that I don't have to deal with it.

Thanks a bunch!   

Feel free to pick apart my post by adding the little quote lines in that you seem to love so much.  Just know that I have wasted enough time on you and won't be bothered to reply.

(Mods I am sorry, but I am sick of his rudeness and bullying.  If you have to ban me I will understand.)

[Jean]

 Bill, you are truly amazing. Thank you!!!!

[Meinuk]

I wouldn't say that the new ESRD Peckham Care^tm Program is selling people a bill of goods, I think that Peckham Care^tm is sending a lot of people up (and down) the River*!

The Peckham Care^tm quality of life* and travel resources* are the best that I have seen in the industry.

I am a proud, card carrying member of the ESRD Peckham Care^tm Program, and I whole heartedly endorse this message.

Anna Bennett
ESRD Survivor

NB: Political mudslinging and polarization is dehumanizing, and deminishes us as a society.  All satire aside, Happy Thanksginving everyone.  Me, I am thankful that people like Bill Peckham put themselves out there to show us that life does not end with ESRD.

*Peckham Care^tm ESRD River Adventures http://www.billpeckham.com/from_the_sharp_end_of_the/2013/08/dialysis-is-like-running-a-river-it-s-best-to-have-your-own-momentum-.html
Quality of Life Resources http://www.billpeckham.com/
Travel Resources http://www.billpeckham.com/from_the_sharp_end_of_the/travel/index.html

[Rerun]

The whole cost of healthcare is outrageous!  Obama and Congress has decided to try and pay for it.  I think that is the wrong idea.  We need to address the COST that is fraudulent.  When a bag of saline cost a dollar to make why then do some places charge $500 a bag or $1,500 a bag and some charge $5.  That is what needs to be addressed.

Medicare has it right.  DaVita charges 66K a month for dialysis and Medicare pays $3K  I love it. 

Insurance companies just laid low and then sprung this on America.  Do away with them.  Make health care affordable again.

Rerun, Moderator

[Deanne]

Shouldn't this be in the political section?

[okarol]

Before you know it, they are going to come after dialysis patients......  It is time we stand up to these arrogant people, you hear me, Peckham? Stop selling these decent people a bill of goods.  A number of people told me about you and AAKP and how you sold dialysis patients down the river.  It is just all about you, right?  It is all about you and not dialysis patients, what a fraud.

Can you elaborate please.  What did people tell you?
How has Bill Peckham (and AAKP) sold dialysis patients down the river?

Oh maybe it was the Colorado River? 

[okarol]

Shouldn't this be in the political section?

That was my first question.
Is it more healthcare, or political?

[Rerun]

There is Political then there is sticking your head in the sand about health care.  People need to know what is going on.  Or just spend the whole time in Off Topic. 

Just my 

Rerun, Moderator  

[Simon Dog]

Dialysis patients were sold a bill of goods when 3x/week rather than every other day became the US standard of care.

[jeannea]

Rerun, if it was presented as a discussion about healthcare I might agree with you. Since it was presented as an attack on Bill I respectfully disagree.

[plugger]

I'm grateful Bill sent the 5280 journalist my way, has sent an example for the way dialysis ought to be, has been involved in the dialysis bundling payments, and as I've said before I'm grateful for him educating me about the epo  scandal back when.

If it was a misjudgment on Bill's part back in his days with AAKP not to get involved with things like dismissed patients, I'm content to leave that between him and his Maker.       

[amanda100wilson]

my, aren't these confusing rants becoming very tedious!

[Bill Peckham]

Now I understand. Mark has fallen down the Dialysis Ethics rabbit hole and into a magical land where the AAKP has the resources of Crassus and the unfocused openness of an Occupy Wall Street drum circle.

Here's a pro tip - when asked to the red or blue pill, the right answer is no.

[plugger]

Ok, I must admit the burn of disappointment from years ago welled up inside me when I saw Mark under the gun on this thread.  Hard to say what would have happened back in the day if you and AAKP had gotten involved in the issue of dismissed patients.  One scenario could have been you could have pulled out of AAKP and just become a footnote in the history of dialysis - which I'm willing to consider.  But I've admired your work since then.

I like to think both of us have built up some nice credentials over the years: you with what I mentioned above and appearing in some top-notch articles, me with helping to head up a group here in Colorado that backed a tech bill that got through the state legislature (twice).

Maybe it is time for you and I revisit the issue of dismissed patients.  Maybe it is time for us -all of us - to start pushing harder on our federal reps to stop this abomination of dismissed patients!  What do you say? 

[Bill Peckham]

I know some people assume that what I choose to write on the internet, here at IHD or in the past at DE or HDC or my own blog or before that the Brumley board or now Facebook, represents the totality of me and what I am doing but that isn't true for me and actually I doubt is true for anyone.

I remember reading posts on DE ten or so years ago and not knowing what world the posters were living in - it'd be some post about what I should be doing or why didn't I do something or why didn't the AAKP act or why didn't I make the AAKP act and I would sit back and think WTF? BEcause I'd know that I had served on the AAKP board for less than two years, that I had been kicked off the AAKP board and that I had nothing to do with the AAKP. All I could think is that people were confusing my NKC involvement with AAKP.

Now NKC, I think I have answered for NKC, at times poorly but we're all working our way up the learning curve. But as far as DE's raison d'être, involuntary dismissals, I'd say NKC is a safe harbor and if all providers performed similarly there would not be a need for DE. Though I am sure some other group would be puffing up how bad dialysis is and telling reporters about dead patients stacked like cord wood, so I'd probably still be getting calls from reporters and having to clear things like that up 

[Hemodoc]

The problem with dismissals is lack of documentation and lack of reporting. It is quite difficult to define a problem with only anecdotal self reported evidence which NO ONE will accept in any administrative capacity. Perhaps that is the first place to start, getting the government to follow dismissals.

As far as the AAKP, I am part of the Medical Advisory Board and we had a recent intense discussion of the ACP and ASN positions on renal screening. Organized nephrology where ever you find them are NOT our friends. Fortunately, there are several on the AAKP MAB that do have a heart for patients, but there are many strong dissenting voices to contend with.

One of the biggest issues is that our numbers classify most issues into an orphan disease category. Japan for instance has a very high incidence of IgA nephropathy and since 1973, they have screened all school children for protein in their urine. They extended this into the work place and community. When discussing the issue with the AAKP MAB, one nephrologist who publishes in medical journal is quite frequently stated that there is NO evidence of any benefit from screening. I pointed out that is if you look at the data from the US only. To make such a statement you must ignore 40 years of documented benefits to patients and the Japanese government in huge cost savings with their screening program.

We remain in a lopsided battle, one where we have little power and a small voice that many simply wish to silence. However, if we are not part of the AAKP and other such organizations, they we truly are on the outside looking in.

I believe our long term hope remains with improvements in technology leading to marketplace competition for the home hemodialysis population. Until the industry can make more off of home hemo and selling their machines, then what we have today will continue or worsen here in the US.