Health Insurance

This is actually strictly not true. A hospital can not legally turn you away if you don't have insurance...you may end up owing ridiculous amounts of money but if you come in with an emergency they are obligated by law to treat you.

no they cant turn you away. but  they can not give you the full treatment that theyd give to a person with insurance.. i know. I was in a car accident injured my leg

   and once I told him i had no insurance, it was a whole new ballgame. I didnt get painkillers for my leg, no treatment at all. The only thing they did was get my leg xrayed, which they legally had to do. and once they found it wasnt broken, I was told to leave.
I had to get my jeans cut off in the ambulance to get access to my leg. and the hospital actually expected me to leave with nothing on but a top,,knickers and my shoes. I had to make a huge scene just to get a pair of trouser scrubs. so yeah they cant turn you away but they can treat you like sh*t

Have people had experience returning with a pre-existing condition? We're lucky, in that we're generally healthy, and could probably get away with catastrophic cover until we were covered by employers, and pay out of pocket for things like birth control, but I wonder what issues people have had getting coverage if they have pre-existing conditions?

i just ran a search for me... non smoker- 27- New jersey.  I was surprised about how cheap- $190/month.  with highish copays- $500/er, etc... with a 30% coinsurance (is that the same thing as deductable?)

def puts my mind as rest a wee bit.

no they cant turn you away. but  they can not give you the full treatment that theyd give to a person with insurance.. i know. I was in a car accident injured my leg

   and once I told him i had no insurance, it was a whole new ballgame. I didnt get painkillers for my leg, no treatment at all. The only thing they did was get my leg xrayed, which they legally had to do. and once they found it wasnt broken, I was told to leave.
I had to get my jeans cut off in the ambulance to get access to my leg. and the hospital actually expected me to leave with nothing on but a top,,knickers and my shoes. I had to make a huge scene just to get a pair of trouser scrubs. so yeah they cant turn you away but they can treat you like sh*t

I am sorry you experienced this, they actually should have treated you better, insurance or not. Although, to be fair, even a person with insurance would have been expected to figure out clothing to get themselves home, it isn't up to the hospital to figure that out for you, since they don't dress their patients.

Although, to be fair, even a person with insurance would have been expected to figure out clothing to get themselves home, it isn't up to the hospital to figure that out for you, since they don't dress their patients.

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I was in a car accident. An ambulance had to take me to the hospital. Am I expected to ask the paramedics to stop at my house so I can pick up some clothing?? I was not from that area, so calling someone to bring me clothing when they live in an entirely differant state was impossible.
I am not saying its the hospitals job to "dress" me, but it is their job to make sure I am safe and not walk out the hospital with just knickers and a shirt on. 


*edited by mod

you have to be f*cking kidding me.
I was in a car accident. An ambulance had to take me to the hospital. Am I expected to ask the paramedics to stop at my house so I can pick up some clothing?? I was not from that area, so calling someone to bring me clothing when they live in an entirely differant state was impossible.
I am not saying its the hospitals job to "dress" me, but it is their job to make sure I am safe and not walk out the hospital with just knickers and a shirt on. 
Why is so hard for you to understand

It isn't hard for me to understand, I said I was sorry you were treated that way, that isn't fair. But I also don't think you should blast the whole system because you weren't given scrubs to wear home until you asked for them. They did give them to you, correct? My point is that I think that has less to do with having or not having insurance and more to do with how hospitals work.

I am not saying its the hospitals job to "dress" me, but it is their job to make sure I am safe and not walk out the hospital with just knickers and a shirt on. 

And actually, as much as it pains me to say this, it really isn't the hospitals job to make sure you don't walk out with just knickers and a shirt on. Their job is to make sure they take care of whatever is wrong with you. While this is wrong it is sadly the way it is.

When we moved to the States, our insurance kicked in the second we activated our work permit and started work. 

If you are associated with a university, even as a post doc, you'll have insurance. 

And DH was taken to a charity hospital once in the US, he had his shirt cut off him.  They gave him a cheapo scrub shirt to wear home. 

In Canada and here, we had to wait for our health care coverage for 3-6 months.  Private insurance was cheap but still....

But I also don't think you should blast the whole system because you weren't given scrubs to wear home until you asked for them.

I am NOT blasting the system because they expected me to walk outside almost naked. If were to read correctly, my original post stated the lack of treatment I got for an injured leg because I had no insurance. I had other injuries while I had insurance and can say I was treated a lot better and was taken care of better.

i just ran a search for me... non smoker- 27- New jersey.  I was surprised about how cheap- $190/month.  with highish copays- $500/er, etc... with a 30% coinsurance (is that the same thing as deductable?)

def puts my mind as rest a wee bit.

30% coinsurance probably means that you will pay 30% of your bill.  Frequently there's a deductible associated with that, too.  So if you have a $10,000 bill with 30% coinsurance and a $500 deductible you'd be paying $2850. 

This is one thing I am worried about... not so much for hubs and I, but for my son.  It's trying to balance out of pocket costs versus insurance costs for the months it will take to get insured.  Also I know this is horrible but given a need for long term care wouldn't we be able to return to the UK if need be? 

Long-term care isn't part of the NHS. Not including Scotland, where long-term care is  paid for, it's funded pretty much the way it is in the US - you're responsible for paying for your own care until you are down to a certain low level of savings. In the UK, the value of your house is included as part of your assets, meaning that you have to sell your house or transfer ownership - I don't know if that's true of the US.

Just wanted to add that I am a nurse and I would have snuck Ah-loom-in-Num some scrub pants or donated trousers whether it was allowed or not.  But still I can see Andrea's point, it's probably the last thing the staff in a chaotic ER are thinking about. There are lots of times Nurses and Doctors have to break the rules for their patients.  A pair of scrub pants are no big deal anyway.  You wouldn't believe some of the stuff we pull to help patients sometimes.

Thank god that I have a job lined up with a no contribution family insurance plan that kicks in from the get go when we go back.  Some of these quotes are  !!

This is one thing I am worried about... not so much for hubs and I, but for my son.  It's trying to balance out of pocket costs versus insurance costs for the months it will take to get insured.  Also I know this is horrible but given a need for long term care wouldn't we be able to return to the UK if need be? 

If you're willing to risk going without insurance (or simply cannot afford anything other than catastrophic cover, or cannot afford anything at all), check to see if your state has a discounted plan for children.  New York does - if you qualify you can purchase *relatively* inexpensive high quality/coverage insurance for your kids that will get them well-child doctors visits, hospital cover, etc.  Here's the NYS Child Health Plus site: http://www.health.state.ny.us/nysdoh/chplus/index.htm

We'd paid for private cover for my husband when we lived in the US before.  It was about $600 just for him.  Apparently prices have gone up.  Plus, if we ever went back, we'd be looking at family cover.  I don't understand why the insurance companies won't offer individuals the same rates they offer businesses, but that's another thread entirely. 

don't forget that the companies pay much of your premiums (or so i think). they don't just get charged $40 p/m