Comment by cebert
Comment by cebert a day ago
Does anyone have something positive to share about UnitedHealth?
Comment by cebert a day ago
Does anyone have something positive to share about UnitedHealth?
Where do you think the $1-2 comes from? Insurance company is double dipping to optimize those profits!
I don't. I have their "platinum" insurance, and they still seem to fight any claim we file.
For example, my wife got knee surgery recently, and the doctor recommended we rent a CPM machine to help her knee avoid atrophying. Renting the machine is $200 a week. Insurance said it was "optional" and refused to cover any of it. We ended up buying a used one on eBay for about $900, which is a lot but not insurmountable for us.
It kind of annoys me though, because not all their clients are yuppie software people who have disposable income. A lot of people can't afford to rent a machine for $200 a week or buy one for $900 on eBay, but they do make it much easier for the leg to heal better. Isn't "stuff that most people can't afford but would help with healing" the stated purpose for health insurance? It seems more than a little unfair that my wife's leg is more likely to heal better purely because she's married to a software engineer.
I really have no fucking idea what the difference between the cheap and expensive UHC plans. It sure seems like I'm paying many thousands of dollars more for medical stuff than I was for equivalent services with Anthem. Oh, well, at least my premiums are higher too, so that's fun.
Hopefully obviously I don't advise shooting a CEO for several reasons (both ethical and legal), but I have to say that I was unable to cry many tears when I heard it happened.
>Isn't "stuff that most people can't afford but would help with healing" the stated purpose for health insurance?
I thought the operative term was "medically necessary"? "would help with healing" can theoretically cover everything from protein shakes for knee injuries, to iPads to help with stroke recovery. A CPM machine is on the far end of this, closer to "medically necessary" than the other examples, but you have to draw the line somewhere, so some reasonable-but-theoretically-optional equipment gets excluded.
Sure. I guess I would draw the line in a different place.
There are plenty of things that aren't strictly "necessary" but are still provided by insurance. My wife's painkiller medication isn't strictly necessary, she wouldn't die without it and the leg would probably heal the same way, but they covered that because obviously they should cover that. I feel like a piece of medical equipment like a CPM machine is more necessary than painkillers.
Well first question to my mind is does a CPM actually help? There's a lot of waste in American Healthcare on expensive but fairly useless treatments.
My guess was that a CPM might fall into this category (I did PhD research in bio mechanics in MatSci). So I googled it and it returned a quote:
> Do doctors still use CPM machines? > The machines are no longer widely used because of the multiple studies that found CPM following knee replacement surgery has minimal benefits. However, some surgeons still recommend CPM following knee surgery when the limited pros outweigh the cons in a particular case. (1)
From an insurers perspective it makes sense not to cover a marginally useful piece of equipment. The better use of resources would probably be covering PT where there's movement and weight on the joint.
1: https://www.verywellhealth.com/do-i-need-a-cpm-following-kne...
Fair enough. It was still prescribed by the doctor and I would rather have not paid for it.
Even if its benefits are marginal, they’re probably still more tangible than acupuncture and chiropractic, both of which are apparently covered by my insurance, and the CPM machine probably doesn’t cause a stroke like chiropractic does.
> Isn't "stuff that most people can't afford but would help with healing" the stated purpose for health insurance?
You are confusing "health insurance" with a "system that guarantees healthcare as a human-right". Those are different things.
The purpose of health insurance is:
- To constrain healthcare coverage to the minimum allowed by law or the plan contract, therefore maximizing profit margins.
- To provide a shared risk coverage pool to pay for treatment for catastrophic health events that are unforeseen.
- To provide a product to be used as leverage by employers over employees as part of the "benefits" of a compensation package.
Healthcare as a human-right doesn't exist in the United States unless a health situation has gotten so bad that you end up in the emergency room, which is then legally required to provide you emergency healthcare.
We have a UHC choice plan at work and it’s been completely invisible, both for me and coworkers I know.
Health insurers are like Congressmen. Most people hate the institution, but are satisfied with their own insurer. https://www.kff.org/affordable-care-act/kff-survey-of-consum...
> I think you're a bad person.
It's not acceptable to comment like this on HN, no matter who it is or what it's in reply to. The guidelines ask us to "assume good faith", "edit out swipes" and "be kind". That applies equally to all of us and in replies to anyone else on HN. If someone posts a comment that's egregious, just flag it, don't abuse the commenter, as it just makes the place worse for everyone.
Please don't sermonize to distract from your own disrespectfulness towards HN and its guidelines.
> usually post racism
If there's evidence of this you should include links in your comment or email us so we can investigate and take action. Rayiner is of South Asian heritage and was born in Asia, which – of course – doesn't preclude racism, but it does at least require us to think twice before presuming his views to come from a place of Western-born white privilege.
> corporate bootlicking
This is an ideologically-charged epithet that’s invoked specifically to be profoundly demeaning. The comment you replied to was simply sharing of his personal experience as a customer of a health insurer. Anyone should be able to do this without being belittled in this way. (Besides that it’s inaccurate; I see Rayiner criticizing corporations often.)
As we've said before, Rayiner takes a lot of arrows on HN because he's about the only well-known participant we have who is notable for regularly espousing conservative/libertarian positions. He also contributes plenty of valuable perspectives from his personal experience as an immigrant, a lawyer, and a compiler-hacker. He's subject to the guidelines like anyone else, and his positions are frequently debated, refuted and flagged by other community members, which is fine. But HN would be the poorer without him.
In this case you're the one who has been escalatory and hostile, and you need to take responsibility for your own conduct before pointing the finger at others.
Please don't reply to a bad comment with a worse one, it just drags the whole place down.
No, but working at a company that was founded by a bunch of former gov employees, the coverage is mostly ok and some having to manage the refusal bs. What was new to me - a gap that went employed -> consulting -> employed - (same company family) - how damn expensive top tier coverage for a family of three really is - $3700/mo. Insane.
> Shooting their CEO caused more people to get claims approved
One, it was a middle manager with a CEO title.
Two, genuine question, can you point out how UnitedHealth’s profits relative to peers changed after the shooting versus before?
I am also not advocating anything but ... wasn't the famous Spock line "needs of the many outweigh the needs of the one". The question is of empirically proving it and that's the challenge. The jury may not be co-opted but the judiciary is. I wonder how do we go about proving this.
Here's a point about all the insurance companies: UHC administers the medical plan on behalf of your employer. For all practical purposes, they are a whipping boy for the real 'man behind the curtain' (your employer).
Your company (for self-funded plans) actually decides what’s covered and what isn’t, sets copays and deductibles, and ultimately saves or spends money on healthcare costs. UHC’s role is to apply those rules, maintain the provider network, and handle the billing and customer service.
If your company offers insurance, there is someone who can tell the "insurance company" to cover the service they are not covering. Usually the HR Benefits Administrator, or 'plan sponsor'. And they do it all the time! If you have a sad story and the budget is ok for the quarter, they will help! If you are a company officer, you can also have whatever your company can afford.
This only applies to large employers. Smaller ones are just presentef a limited list of plans to pick from, and the plans change every year. Most of the time, as a startup, you can’t buy a Mag7 equivalent health plan for any amount of money off the marketplace
Mag7 surely is self insured. They have an amazing risk pool of young people. Probably biggest cost is babies. So in this way employer sponsored health insurance screws the rest of the market, as it "hordes" the best risks. The insurance companies then wail about the cost of the risker pool of those of us stuck in the smaller plans...
There should only be one risk pool which is the whole country. Unfortunately the republicans want to go the other way and push sick people into high risk pools which will be unaffordable for a lot of people
It depends. If your employer is part of a self-funded group of other employers, then there is a group of trustees from all the employers that can approve.
If it's a 'fully insured' group plan then the insurance company is technically in charge, but your company can do an Employer-paid exception (aka carve-out reimbursement) to cover something thats getting rejected. They also have the option to purchase add-on policies to add coverage for upper class stuff like fertility treatments, weight loss drugs, or gender-affirming care.
Insurance companies are a whipping boy, but for doctors not your employer.
Doctors charge massively high prices, which is why insurance bills are high. Doctors have the most powerful trade union on the planet and strictly limit residencies, thus limiting new doctor supply and keeping prices super high.
Yeah I really like their rewards program: https://e-i.uhc.com/uhcrewards
Each year they pay me $1,000 (in the form of HSA deposits, which I can invest) to do basic things like get a checkup, get a flu shot, and get a blood test. I sync my wear-able data and they pay me $1-2 each time I exercise or get enough sleep.
It's great!