Doctors get KICKBACKS for spinal fusion Implants...

[1171]

I'm not trying to be right or wrong.
i posted an article on medical hardware abuse that's relevant to this board.
everyone is entitled to their own opinion about it.
everyone has their bias including those in the medical profession.

[Wink]

(12-21-2010 03:04 PM)bronco54501 Wrote:  You both are correct, as I said patients vary.. weight/pt/ot/ people dont try / people that do try.. There are several vaibles that factor the out come between failed/success.....

I have the popcorn ready...............lol

LOL!

[mikeyb1968]

Hello everyone. I am new to this site and the forums. I just posted a new thread on a different topic and while checking out the site...I found this thread. My story is slightly off topic, but relavent in ways of cost.
I had a lower lumbar spinal fusion in 2006. (Don't wish it on anybody) My story is pertaining to costs. After the surgery and 7 days in the hospital, I was at home and got a call from my insurance company. They told me my Doctor ok'd a "Bone Healing Machine" for me to wear and speed up my healing. They told me the cost of the machine was $5,850.00 and my insurance would cover it. Ok...great...ooops...wait a minute....they called back and said "sorry insurance will cover $2,100.00...I would owe the rest". I said no thanks. Low and behold....they ended up giving me the machine for what the insurance covered. Now don't get me wrong...I'm grateful for getting it, but whats the mark-up and extra charges for these type of things? If my insurance would have been more...the company selling the machine would have been paid more. It just boggles my mind how so many things are overcharged to insurance companies and then it gets passed on in premiums. I mean if it cost $5,800.00...how can they sell it for $2,100.00? OVERCHARGING!!!

[bodybuilder1958]

The markup is tremendous.
My son is on c-pap, the medical supply company charges our insurance over $1400. for just the mask. I can buy that same mask on Ebay for $95.

Insurance companies, businesses can bargain the amounts, have reductions built in. Doctors can do the same if they feel the patient truly needs the device. Yeppers, we're being screwed.

[jayne]

Not really BB this is America and it is their product they can charge what they want for it....I do for my garden produce......I charge family nothing....people who come to the house a certain price and at the produce stand more...early in the season I can get more for my produce and fresh eggs than I can in mid season when I am swimming in produce.....and everyone has tomatoes... do I take advantage you bet I do....I sell early and can mid season.....if no one buys their product at 5000 they cut it to 2000.......some buy at 5 some at 3 some at 2 either way they make money.....start at the top and go down till it sells

[bodybuilder1958]

Jayne I more than understand making a profit. It's how people survive, expand, leading to more and better products. The point is this. I negotiated having plastic surgery 5 years ago. The top price that I got was from the hospital I worked for. I ended up getting the surgery at a same day surgical center (top rated), for nearly 60% less than anybody else. Because I had cash, I was paying for it all up front. The hospital I worked for wasn't willing to play ball.

Build a better mouse trap I say. But if companies are happy with taking 60% less and still make a profit then people who don't have the means are the ones being screwed.

[Wink]

(12-20-2010 01:48 PM)1171 Wrote:  spinal implants became big profit generators for device makers. The screws used to drill into bone, known as pedicle screws, sell for $1,000 to $2,000 apiece but cost less than $100 to make. A bone-growth protein used to help vertebrae fuse can sell for more than $5,000 a pack, depending on the size.
......
Another study of workers' compensation cases published this year in the online edition of the journal Spine showed that patients who had a spinal fusion were much less likely to return to work within two years after their surgery than a group of patients with similar conditions who didn't have surgery, and that 27% of them had to be re-operated on. Their rate of permanent disability was more than five times as high as the patients whose spines weren't fused, and their daily intake of powerful narcotic painkillers increased by 41% after surgery.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424..._US_News_3

Yep, sounds like a duck to me, 1171. All one needs to do is GOOGLE corporate whistleblowers medtronic. The evidence seems to be there...and then some.

[jamboski73]

(12-20-2010 01:48 PM)1171 Wrote:  spinal implants became big profit generators for device makers. The screws used to drill into bone, known as pedicle screws, sell for $1,000 to $2,000 apiece but cost less than $100 to make. A bone-growth protein used to help vertebrae fuse can sell for more than $5,000 a pack, depending on the size.
......
Another study of workers' compensation cases published this year in the online edition of the journal Spine showed that patients who had a spinal fusion were much less likely to return to work within two years after their surgery than a group of patients with similar conditions who didn't have surgery, and that 27% of them had to be re-operated on. Their rate of permanent disability was more than five times as high as the patients whose spines weren't fused, and their daily intake of powerful narcotic painkillers increased by 41% after surgery.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424..._US_News_3

Wow! That is ridiculous and unbelievable! And here we are injured and getting chump change checks..if that. Awesome research 1171

[1171]

yup.
a lot of the denials are about the dispute on costs between the carriers and the doctors/hospitals with the injured workers caught in the middle.