Thomas at the American doctor, he found the key to try to escape!
In July, we fought hard to find a home. Another battle then was to find health insurance as quickly as possible, because here there is no social security to pay for health bills, which are also rather salty:
A pub that we receive every week: $ 169 only for new patients (follow the asterisk: Regular price $ 403 visited Yes, it's 320 euros!)
Find health insurance was difficult because to do that we must address, that we did not have yet. And no question of taking risks with Thomas, especially when we know that a hospital day costing over $ 2,000 on average. Fortunately, Barack Obama has been there with its reform (unpopular) of the US health system. In California, there is therefore a dedicated platform to find health insurance "affordable"
Covered California offers health insurance for all, with government support and everything!
The big change in the Obama reform is that health insurance is required to cover a number of expenses and offer bundled services with easy to recognize codes: Gold, Silver, Bronze. Thus the Kaiser Permanente insurance Bronze is 98% the same as the competitor at Bronze, and Covered California offers comparative tables with prices, themselves now capped by law. Because before, it was the jungle and I must admit that unless expert, it was hard to know for which you paid and what was covered or not.
So Why Is This Unpopular Reform?
1-It regulates competition among private companies (health services) by laws. In the land of free enterprise, it is frowned upon.
2-It requires all US residents to have health coverage, ie to pay for access to these services, under penalty of a fine. All who felt they did not need it or do not
have the means to do so have had to put it without choice.
To be complete on the topic, and to prove how much he must not touch the freedom of Americans, Obama is now the most unpopular US president since World War II. Even Bush was more popular in its time, which is incredible!
Only 39% of Americans were in favor of the reform of the health system.
Sacramento Kaiser Permanente hospital is brand new
For our part, we chose the least expensive health insurance, costing us still more than $ 600 a month (480 euros) for 3 people. In this case, one is forced to choose a doctor at a medical center for health insurance, which therefore has its own hospitals, pharmacies and doctors!
It's a bit confusing when you come from a system where everything is public, but I must admit that it is rather well done because you can have the CVs of doctors and choose them according to their qualifications, languages that they talk or other criteria. Taking his appointment directly from the website of the insurance, confirmations are received by e-mail and SMS is super modern. When the time comes for the appointment, it is taken at the precise time and everything is explained in detail.
We see a nurse who pose a small ankle bracelet Thomas, with his name and surname, then the doctor asks some questions, auscultates Thomas, we take stock of vaccines, and a second nurse arrives with 5 syringes 5 different vaccines ... what Thomas did not really appreciated.
When repairs, doctor hands us a dossier summarizing the visit, with tips, information and details sheet for each vaccine!
We then left the hospital without spending a dime. Thomas got a little book as a gift (5 dressings and thighs). We even offered to make us free vaccination against influenza. Free, everything is relative when you know what you pay every month, but we had a real quality of service, and I admit I was very pleasantly surprised that first visit.
And that's not all, because once arrived home, we received a thank you email from Dr. Thomas, with the French title and explanations on the functioning of the system. Certainly it is a generic message, but it took a minute to customize it a bit: That's also what the meaning of the typical US service.
The friendly email the doctor arrived soon after the visit
I do not think I could get to speak well of the US health system, but it is clear that this first experience was near perfect. The initial problem to address because we still have not received our insurance cards, but as I've said, nothing works the first time so it's normal. From our point of view; Barack Obama has really done things moving in the right direction, even if it was highly unwelcome here.
One last point about the cost of health: Our contract has a "yearly maximum out of pocket" for $ 12,000, which means that whatever happens, we will never have more than $ 12,000 per year out out of pocket health expenditure (plus 12 monthly payments to about $ 600 or more than $ 7,000 per year). So, to be truly ready to face any event, keep $ 20,000 in a bank account, just in case ... This is not nothing, is not it?
Ok Now Ready .. Enjoy !! :)
Covered California offers health insurance for all, with government support and everything!
The big change in the Obama reform is that health insurance is required to cover a number of expenses and offer bundled services with easy to recognize codes: Gold, Silver, Bronze. Thus the Kaiser Permanente insurance Bronze is 98% the same as the competitor at Bronze, and Covered California offers comparative tables with prices, themselves now capped by law. Because before, it was the jungle and I must admit that unless expert, it was hard to know for which you paid and what was covered or not.
So Why Is This Unpopular Reform?
1-It regulates competition among private companies (health services) by laws. In the land of free enterprise, it is frowned upon.
2-It requires all US residents to have health coverage, ie to pay for access to these services, under penalty of a fine. All who felt they did not need it or do not
have the means to do so have had to put it without choice.
To be complete on the topic, and to prove how much he must not touch the freedom of Americans, Obama is now the most unpopular US president since World War II. Even Bush was more popular in its time, which is incredible!
Only 39% of Americans were in favor of the reform of the health system.
Sacramento Kaiser Permanente hospital is brand new
For our part, we chose the least expensive health insurance, costing us still more than $ 600 a month (480 euros) for 3 people. In this case, one is forced to choose a doctor at a medical center for health insurance, which therefore has its own hospitals, pharmacies and doctors!
It's a bit confusing when you come from a system where everything is public, but I must admit that it is rather well done because you can have the CVs of doctors and choose them according to their qualifications, languages that they talk or other criteria. Taking his appointment directly from the website of the insurance, confirmations are received by e-mail and SMS is super modern. When the time comes for the appointment, it is taken at the precise time and everything is explained in detail.
We see a nurse who pose a small ankle bracelet Thomas, with his name and surname, then the doctor asks some questions, auscultates Thomas, we take stock of vaccines, and a second nurse arrives with 5 syringes 5 different vaccines ... what Thomas did not really appreciated.
When repairs, doctor hands us a dossier summarizing the visit, with tips, information and details sheet for each vaccine!
We then left the hospital without spending a dime. Thomas got a little book as a gift (5 dressings and thighs). We even offered to make us free vaccination against influenza. Free, everything is relative when you know what you pay every month, but we had a real quality of service, and I admit I was very pleasantly surprised that first visit.
And that's not all, because once arrived home, we received a thank you email from Dr. Thomas, with the French title and explanations on the functioning of the system. Certainly it is a generic message, but it took a minute to customize it a bit: That's also what the meaning of the typical US service.
The friendly email the doctor arrived soon after the visit
I do not think I could get to speak well of the US health system, but it is clear that this first experience was near perfect. The initial problem to address because we still have not received our insurance cards, but as I've said, nothing works the first time so it's normal. From our point of view; Barack Obama has really done things moving in the right direction, even if it was highly unwelcome here.
One last point about the cost of health: Our contract has a "yearly maximum out of pocket" for $ 12,000, which means that whatever happens, we will never have more than $ 12,000 per year out out of pocket health expenditure (plus 12 monthly payments to about $ 600 or more than $ 7,000 per year). So, to be truly ready to face any event, keep $ 20,000 in a bank account, just in case ... This is not nothing, is not it?
Ok Now Ready .. Enjoy !! :)
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