The Wall Street Journal’s Health Blog had a cringe-inducing story today about the creeping cost of health care. It estimated that by 2016 the average yearly health care premium could be as high as $24,000. That equals 45% of median household income. Right now much of that cost is borne by employers. The article also estimated that copayments could go up to $30 – that’s my copayment now. Hopefully it won’t go up anymore. But $30 is still better than $200-300 for an office visit.
On the dental side, we have to keep in mind that employers sign up for dental coverage for their employees when they sign up for medical coverage. That’s how it works most of the time. So it’s not a stretch to imagine that as employers seek lower cost coverage (read: higher deductible, higher copayments, more exclusionary clauses) it could trickle down into our field. We have already had a few patients in our practice tell us that their employer is not continuing with dental and vision care for 2009. These patients are burning through their 2008 maximum to get the work done.
Ask your patients how their plans will be designed next year. Most will respond with “I really don’t know.” This is when you say:
“Have your HR person call me with any questions – I’m happy to help.”
In a future post I’ll post about what to say to the HR manager. Many of you have been in this situation and realize the importance of talking to this person. Back to the WSJ blog entry – become healthy now. Seems like bad health in 2016 will break the bank.
Just wanted to say HI. I found your blog a few days ago on Technorati and have been reading it over the past few days.
The high price of good dental treatments are going to hit badly the life of median group. Thanks to health tourism packages, they are finding their importance.
Health Tourism is growing phenomenally. It’s something that the uninsured, the less insured and even the insurers are seriously considering in countries like the U.S. and Europe. It is estimated that $2 billion people will come to India as a part of the medical tourism initiative by 2012. And a good part of this crowd will come down to India for dental treatment.this would be useful for median group people
i came across some websites which emphasis on the need for medical or dental tourism.please tell me are they really true and good. the websites are
http://www.healthtourismnews.com and
http://www.asiasmedicaltourism.com