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Exactly the same situation is in rest of the world, no patient is shopping around. just goes usually to closest/biggest hospital. Yet we don't have this tragic

Exactly the same situation is in rest of the world, no patient is shopping around. just goes usually to closest/biggest hospital. Yet we don't have this tragic mess US has. So its not about shopping around, rather some other reason like regulations, wrong dynamics between hospitals and insurances etc. You don't have better equipment nor doctors in US compared to biggest hospitals in Switzerland for example. Yet we have fraction of the costs as patients, and its not due to low doctors/staff salaries. Equipment is also top notch everywhere, new machines in all departments.

refurb 5y ago
Switzerland is #2 in per capita healthcare costs after the US. US is $11k per capita and Switzerland is $7k per capita. Countries like Finland (4.2k) and New Zealand ($4.1k) show Switzerland could be doing way better. Maybe the pot shouldn’t call the kettle black? https://data.oecd.org/healthres/health-spending.htm https://data.oecd.org/healthres/health-spending.htm
usrusr 5y ago
I believe that in the end, it boils down to culture, with all the regulatory dysfunction and market dynamics acting as intermediary. In the US getting wealthy seems to be almost implicitly well respected, no matter how you got there. At least if it's not obviously illegal. You found a tweak to squeeze more money from health insurances? Good for you, let them suffer for their apparent weakness. There's apparently still a threshold of where even success cannot vindicate the way to get there (that Oxycotin family comes to mind) but that threshold is super high. I believe that this threshold is much lower almost everywhere else on earth and that this has an influence on individual decisions on all levels. It doesn't even remotely make people elsewhere angels or something like that, but it's a little bit of friction in every decision towards "take what you can"
splix 5y ago
I believe that "closest/biggest hospital" is a choice in emergency. Or when it's something unimportant. Otherwise people tend to choose a doctor and clinic based on reviews or recommendations, or maybe years of experience. Even with a free healthcare you still have a paid private medicine and a free public one. And they have to compete which leads the price going down, because one side is always zero or close to it. Not like it's in the US where the direction is opposite as you don't have a zero side but only "unbelievable high price" side.
- vidarh 5y ago
  Even in relative emergencies. I'm in the UK. Years ago, my ex fell towards a glass door, and trust her arm through a thick glass pane, getting a nasty cut down her lower arm that exposed her tendons (I saw them... Not a pleasant anatomy lesson). After she was stabilised by the ER/A&E, she was told to come back in the morning (her arm was still open, but bandaged) to get properly patched up. Instead of going back to the nearest hospital, the following morning we went to the A&E of one an hour away with a good reputation for cosmetic surgery. A&E can't turn you away. It gave her a few days of waiting in hospital (she was not a high risk patient, but they did want her available and under observation), but it gave her a leading specialist on hand surgery. And we walked out with no bill. (and you're right - there'd still be the private options too, but in this case the NHS option had some of the best surgeons in the country in that field anyway)

refurb 5y ago

Switzerland is #2 in per capita healthcare costs after the US. US is $11k per capita and Switzerland is $7k per capita. Countries like Finland (4.2k) and New Zealand ($4.1k) show Switzerland could be doing way better. Maybe the pot shouldn’t call the kettle black? https://data.oecd.org/healthres/health-spending.htm https://data.oecd.org/healthres/health-spending.htm

usrusr 5y ago

I believe that in the end, it boils down to culture, with all the regulatory dysfunction and market dynamics acting as intermediary. In the US getting wealthy seems to be almost implicitly well respected, no matter how you got there. At least if it's not obviously illegal. You found a tweak to squeeze more money from health insurances? Good for you, let them suffer for their apparent weakness. There's apparently still a threshold of where even success cannot vindicate the way to get there (that Oxycotin family comes to mind) but that threshold is super high. I believe that this threshold is much lower almost everywhere else on earth and that this has an influence on individual decisions on all levels. It doesn't even remotely make people elsewhere angels or something like that, but it's a little bit of friction in every decision towards "take what you can"

splix 5y ago

I believe that "closest/biggest hospital" is a choice in emergency. Or when it's something unimportant. Otherwise people tend to choose a doctor and clinic based on reviews or recommendations, or maybe years of experience. Even with a free healthcare you still have a paid private medicine and a free public one. And they have to compete which leads the price going down, because one side is always zero or close to it. Not like it's in the US where the direction is opposite as you don't have a zero side but only "unbelievable high price" side.

vidarh 5y ago
Even in relative emergencies. I'm in the UK. Years ago, my ex fell towards a glass door, and trust her arm through a thick glass pane, getting a nasty cut down her lower arm that exposed her tendons (I saw them... Not a pleasant anatomy lesson). After she was stabilised by the ER/A&E, she was told to come back in the morning (her arm was still open, but bandaged) to get properly patched up. Instead of going back to the nearest hospital, the following morning we went to the A&E of one an hour away with a good reputation for cosmetic surgery. A&E can't turn you away. It gave her a few days of waiting in hospital (she was not a high risk patient, but they did want her available and under observation), but it gave her a leading specialist on hand surgery. And we walked out with no bill. (and you're right - there'd still be the private options too, but in this case the NHS option had some of the best surgeons in the country in that field anyway)