Who Pays for Baby?

01.11.2011

In the LA Times Business Section last month, there was an interesting article about who pays for having a baby. Apparently, Californians who have to buy private insurance find maternity benefits to be scarce and expensive. Here are some highlights that I found striking throughout the article:

- The average cost to deliver a baby has reached nearly $13,000. With maternity insurance, the bill can be as low as $250.

- 81% of women who buy their own policies, don’t get maternity benefits because it’s too expensive.

- Pregnancy itself is a problem for health companies. Many consider it to be a pre-existing condition; therefore, you won't get covered if applying for coverage after becoming pregnant. (This is my favorite.)

- Blue Shield and Anthem Blue Cross are the only private insurance companies to offer maternity benefits but at an astronomical cost.

What’s fascinating to me is that so many people encourage healthcare privatization (especially with universal healthcare in our midst) – and yet, to have a baby with private insurance could bankrupt you. How is this logical?

Our society presses for couples to have a baby but will create ways to not help you.

Our society presses for couples to have a baby but will find ways to charge you for one.

Our society presses for couples to have a baby but will limit your options.

I’m not saying it should be free or that the government should pay for you to have a baby. Of course that’s not what I’m saying. You make the decision to have a baby, you should pay for it. BUT, it should not be considered a pre-existing condition, you should not be limited to just two insurance companies who are looking to rape you with costs, and something is definitely wrong when there’s a $12,750 difference between a couple having a baby that is insured and one who is not.

Apparently I Am Looking for a Needle

05.10.2010

Continuing my ridiculous search for an OB/GYN. Those doctors who came recommended to me since my last OB/GYN posting are either not taking new patients, don’t take my insurance or are out of network completely, meaning, since I’m in the UCLA network I can’t see the doctor who is, for example, at Cedars or who is affiliated with another hospital.

Who would have thought that in this day and age of supposed expediency, networking and technological advances that finding a god damned doctor would be so 17^th Century?

I always claimed that I was born in the wrong century, but really, that was just for a laugh. I never meant it!

Looking for a Dr., Not a Needle in a Haystack

05.04.2010

I’m in need of an OB/GYN and I can’t begin to explain how difficult and ridiculous this process has become. It’s become a theatrical production, to say the least.

I’ve gotten several referrals from friends, neighbors, and even on-line but none are in my insurance network. Where I live, there are only 3 doctors within 5 miles that are on my plan. I know I could extend the miles but let’s zoom in on the number 3. In a city of thousands…

I started hating insurance companies back in 1994 when I injured my ankle and went through a nightmare of dealing with them and what they would and would not cover all the while I could not walk and no doctor could figure out what was wrong with me. After multiple x-rays, an MRI, and 2 different doctors who both found my case inconclusive but pumped my ankle with cortisone, I finally found a podiatrist who found a problem (not the problem) and with treatment and $600 orthodics that I had to pay from my own pocket, I was at least able to walk again.

Ladies and gentleman, it should not be this hard. I’m not even going to go into how doctors lack people skills anymore. I’m just focusing on the fact how hard it is to find a doctor/specialist. The issue of “people skills” comes in at a close second.

Rob and I were talking about me going to a gyno to take a fertility test but we were hit with some insurance stupidity (they dropped me w/o telling us cause my primary care physician left his group) and this had caused temporary havoc. But, as a result of a recent MRI for my back, I was given some results today that strongly suggest I go to a gyno as soon as possible and so now the hunt is on and it’s pissing me off. It really should not be this hard and what I’m truly scared of is when it comes time to find a pediatrician. I have only heard horror stories…