Health Reform, Entrepreneurship And Your Business

Vital topic. Excellent venue. Anybody in Biznik who thinks the thing is broken and needs fixing needs to make a point of being there for this event.

Thanks Dan for setting this up.

Thanks for setting this up. As a small business owner, I have a strong interest in this issue.

Wish I could make it but I live in KC! As a small business owner I would most definitely attend if I lived in the Seattle area. Hope everyone has a good time!

You are so brave to take on this issue. Prepare to gain new fans and alienate others anytime you take on religion or politics and attempt to represent a large group of diverse people on an issue with such partisan energy around it. I'll be out of town, but I wish you the best!

Here is a good question for the panelists:

"It is my understanding that your typical Doctor's 'mal-practice' insurance premiums are significantly higher then a Professional Engineer's 'errors-and-omissions' insurance. However a P.E. has the potential to harm or kill a lot more people then your typical M.D. does. In light of this inequality, what specific TORT reform measures need to be implemented at the Federal level to make a doctor's professional insurance more affordable to the doctor, so that the doctor could lower, or at least hold steady his fees he must charge patients and any kind of insurance (both public and private.)??

Thanks, Dan, for setting this up! Very important! I have listened and still am not clear how to provide positive input and have leverage. You are providing that opportunity and educating us as well. THANK YOU!

I agree that health care needs to be fixed. I do think that a health care discussion should have panel members that are unbiased.

The American Medical Association has already made a deal with the government and has signed onboard obama's health care reform you will not get an unbiased response from them.

The King County Board of Health will go along party lines.

The people that will be most affected by the proposed government run health care are Entrepreneurs and Small Business like myself.

I so wish I could be there. Unfortunately, I have clients that evening :( Here's a question : Please explain the pros and cons about selling health insurance across state lines.

Dan, I feel like I have way more to learn about this issue than one panel can teach me. Is there any way we could hear from representatives for more of the affected entities? I would love to hear from:

• A medical litigation attorney

• At least one of the major insurance providers (Regence? Premera?)

• Group Health, a non-profit hybrid service provider/insurer

• Pharmaceutical industry

• Medicare and/or Medicaid

• WA State employee who can recite current laws and programs covering insurance, Medicaid, social safety nets, etc.

• Federal employee who can recite current law and answer questions about current programs

• Qlliance or some other Direct Medical organization that is innovating new ways to manage health care

• Non-profit organizations that help the uninsured or medically needy

• Even a large corporation or two.

I guess my concern is that I would have a hard time endorsing a specific position statement without hearing from more points of view.

Much of what I am hearing and reading is so full of indirect information, inflammatory language, and exaggeration. I would like to make a decision based on as many facts as I can get.

Is there any way you might consider having a series of these panel discussions around different themes before taking a position?

Due to my health condition, I am unable to attend. You are brave, but you have left out both political parties designed to have specific discussions on Health Care Reform. As such, they have been Twittered, so they can choose to attend if they want.

The reality is if it passes versus not pass. The bill will not be re-written. Parts could be removed. It is lawyersspeak writing doctorsspeak and the 2 do not translate exactly into everyday operation.

A failed bill will cause health care costs to soar, small businesses will suffer worse than they are today. There will be a lot of sick people uncovered, and with the advent of Swine Flu ready to hit hard, many people could die painful deaths.

One more suggested question:

Can we assume that most would rather it be our doctors earning the lion's share of any profit created through their hard work... not the insurance companies?

The obvious benefit of a lower 'cost-of-business' for the entrepreneurial doctor as the market would attract more of the best and brightest to the field which would increase supply of medical services and therefore decrease prices, (or at least hold back inflation of prices.)

In light of this, we must intelligently ask: what health-care reform ideas can or will lower the "over-head" costs that every doctor struggles with in our current health-care business environment and is necessarily passed on to the consumer (via higher premiums if you have insurance, or higher cash prices for services)?

questions for panelist

1. when health care cost and the unfunded liabilities peak at several Trillion in a decade won't government run health care have to be rationed, potentially in a very disastrous form similar to Germany's health care and budgetary crisis prior to WW2.

2. I have met several doctors that don't want to or can't afford to service medicare and Medicaid patients. They say they have gone as far as 1. quitting the practice, 2. just stopped serving them, 3. stopped accepting new clients, and provides these people with free service out side of government harassment.

3. I am told what we have now is a free market health care system. I tend to disagree, there are many monopolies and oligopolies throughout the system that are propped up by the government via heavy regulations what are your thoughts. This is not necessarily free market and are there solutions in dissolving some these market interferences.

4. What are your opinions concerning, cost, quality and other issues for the current health care government programs?

Hi Dan, I just realized that I overcommitted myself for Thursday evening,a nd therefore can't come, however, I am very interested in changing our self employed health care options - because - the ones I have been working with just don't work!

If you have any other forums, I'll make sure the event is at the top of my schedule. Let me know how I can help.

Dan, I'm sorry but I too will not be able to attend. Best wishes and I hope the event proves to be beneficial.

In a word, we should be ashamed of our current system and work toward a solution that provides a decent level of care for all Americans. Such a solution will present many compromises to our current level of care, especially to those individuals who have come to expect, and are able to receive health insurance.

Some of these compromises will be longer wait times for care, as in the Canadian Health Care System which "rations-out" healthcare to those most needy at the time. Waiting for health care is a foreign concept to Americans and a bit disconcerting also. But, how many Americans are waiting for health care now? In fact, are we waiting much longer than Canadians for treatment? What about the unemployed American with a serious health issue who hopes to delay treatment until his insurance takes effect thus avoiding a pre existing condition? What about the American who has a good job, has a great insurance plan, but is struck down by a grave illness that bankrupts his family? Are Americans not waiting for health care now?

Until all Americans, or at least a great majority of them can find compassion for their fellow countrymen, I don't see how we can fix our current system. All the Europeans I've talked with are very proud of the fact that their fellow countrymen receive health care. Perhaps not the best health care, but decent health care nonetheless.

I don't know if you call it compassion, some including the poor might call it charity, but at what point do we find the pain too great not to compromise our own lifestyle and see to it that our fellow man is cared for.

Individuals, by nature, are selfish. At the same time we choose behavior that enhances our survival. Our current health care system and those lucky to participate in it cannot go forward without creating insurmountable social ills that will ultimately bring down the "high" standard of living we are all accustomed to. Again, at what point do we find the pain great enough to demand that all Americans receive health care?

i agree with you Darrell Kirk.

i have friends in europe and have talked to people in canada.

the usa should copy the canadian and some aspects of the european system.

i want single payer like they have in europe and canada.

i think to really get single payer we might need to go on strike in the usa- and refuse to accept the system as it is now.

i think even homeless and unemployed people should all get healthcare.

my friend in norway says that is how it works there.

everyone is covered just by paying taxes and homeless people can also go see a doctor if they need to in norway.

the usa spends SO MUCH MONEY ON WAR and yet we cannot afford healthcare for all? HOGWASH!

plus the usa already spends more than canada. canadians are covered already.

money is wasted in the usa. for profit insurance companies are bad.

i want a totally changed system like they have in canada.

everyone in the usa could be covered with the money we already spend if we totally change the system.

also war veterans should be fully covered and also mentally ill people.

Shannon,

Thank you for your comments, and passion for this important topic!

ARGHHH, I have to work tonight and 'save-the-day' again for a client.

Biz first. Politics second. Usually the more wise course of action...

Wish I could have been there!

Great Job Biznik and Panel on great discussion. Good to know that a "Single Payer" system is still too controversial to mention in the health care debate. Yes, we are in outer space here in Seattle, and yes, the rest of the USA is a very conservative place. Some great things going on here locally with the "Washington Small Business for Secure Health Care Coalition" and look forward to seeing these take-off further. Thanks to all who attended--you had some great questions and comments and were very passionate about his topic.

Thanks so much for hosting the event on Healthcare and Small Businesses last night at Seattle University. I'm very much interested in contributing thoughts to the recommendations/stance Biznik will take on this issue. This was a good start and we all need to make sure some of the little things are in place from the beginning. Having a big picture is good, but 'the devil is in the details'.... I think our state insurance commissioner, Mike Kreidler, needs to hear these concerns.

thanks for having this.

i was late in getting there and didn't feel like speaking up...

but single payer is the way i want the usa to go and i feel like that will never happen here.

i am considering finding a way to move to europe! or canada.