The feasible solutions to
medicare raising costs:
- Based on what you have learned and
your own research what do you think would be feasible solutions to
Medicare raising costs?In order to prevent Medicare from raising
costs, costs must be controlled.Cost control needs to occur at the
provider side as well as on the patient side.The components of
Medicare are Part A, Hospital Costs and Long Term Care; Part B,
Physicianor outpatient expenses; and Part C, Prescription Drug
Coverage. Medicare mainly covers the elderly above 65 or disabled
individuals.
- In general, when attempting to
control insurance costs, one must begin with risk management. The
following challenges make cost savings politically difficult, if
not utopic.Pooling of Elderly InsuredAs Medicare covers largely the
elderly population, there is a given cost level associated with the
fact that a pool of insured elderly and disabled, even a huge
national pool, will invariablybe at the higher end of incurring
adverse events and resulting in higher medical costs.
- Although the pool is sufficiently
large to prevent true prediction of risk, given the age of the
insured, costs would be expected to be higher.As the government is
the insurer of the elderly and the disabled, it has put itself in
the impossible situation of providing endless healthcare to an
aging population. I do not know where I stand on this subject as I
would want all the care available regardless of my age at the time
when I am ill.
Therefore, I am not for cutting of
benefits, increasing coinsurance payments, out of pocket expenses,
or copayments. I believe these are unimaginative, stale adjustments
that are counter intuitive to the so-called paternalistic motive
for intervention by which the government seeks to ensure
consumption smoothing for individuals who are not otherwise, safe
from adverse events and medical conditions. I believe that
innovation allows us to realize significant cost cutting now. I
believe in the exploration of the information that will become
available as part of this cost cutting measure, we will gain new
insights that will then enable us to further diagnose the cost
challenge in new ways.
1. Use data to drive down cost
2. Analyze the data for new
insights
3. Determine the 2nd phase of
improving health care (medicare)
Health Incentives for the
Elderly:
- Before I get into the data part, I
want to elaborate on a low cost approach that surely will yield
medical benefits and lower health care costs for Medicare.
- I have been privileged to have met
my neighbors about 11 years ago, when I moved into myhome. They are
now 85 and 80 years old. Over the years, close bouts with near
death have been overcome and I played an active role in standing
guard overnight in emergency rooms,and assisting in communications,
etc.
- Medicare is a Public social
insurance program that is administered by the federal government,
and presently using approximately 30 private insurance companies
within the United States. It offers health insurance for U.S
citizens aged 65 years and above, who have worked and also made
payments to the system. Besides, it also offers health insurance to
young individuals with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, end stage
renal, and any forms of disabilities.
- Medicare provides health insurance
cover to over 48 million individuals, and for that case, it serves
a large population across America (Gruber, 2013). In the long run,
the cost of providing this service has been on the increase in the
recent past owing to the current financial crisis facing the
healthcare industry in the U.S. Therefore, this paper seeks to
establish a critical analysis of feasible solutions to Medicare
raising costs.
Discussion:
- Although it is a difficult task to
reduce Medicare costs, limiting spending to resourceful uses can
provide a potential avenue for reducing the raising Medicare costs.
Here is a closer look at some of the key interventions to reduce
the raising Medicare costs.
Increasing the competition
for health insurance:
- When a single entity
provides health insurance service, it tends to misuse the existing
monopoly by twisting prices anyhow. However, by increasing
competition among firms providing health insurance services, then
it is apparent that most of these firms will have to reduce the
cost of Medicare services (Gruber, 2013).
Increasing the age for
eligibility :
- Increasing the age for eligibility
from age 65 to a figure like 67 can eliminate a considerable amount
of the current deficit facing Medicare provision (Gruber, 2013). In
the long run, the contained deficit will result into a decrease in
Medicare costs.
Eliminating some covered
services :
- At present, Medicare primarily
covers the services needed for the treatment of either a disease or
an injury. However, it does not cover long-term care or the
prescription of drugs (Gruber, 2013). By terminating the coverage
of such services can solve around two-fifths of the entire
Medicare’s long-range deficit, which will in turn lead to reduced
costs.
Increasing recoveries from
other insurance companies:
- In review, Medicare is often a
secondary payer to other types of health insurance like
employer-sponsored insurance, worker’s compensation, auto liability
insurance, and Veterans administration benefits (Gruber, 2013).
However, expanding the circumstances in which Medicare should be
regarded a secondary payer can help reduce Medicare costs by
far.
Reducing payment rates to
providers :
- In order to contain the raising
Medicare costs, it is important for the rates under which Medicare
reimburses are provided through RBRVS and DRGs to be reduced or the
yearly increases limited.
Conclusion :
- In conclusion, the healthcare
industry faces a great challenge of averting the increasing
Medicare costs. However, with the abovementioned proposals,
Medicare costs can be contained and other related health insurance
normalized.