Health care makes me sick

This is Hudson's most expensive toy. He received this from the surgery center where he had his eye operation. He has played with it NEVER and it cost us just a mere $602.59.

I am grateful for health insurance. I think it is a bunch of crap and I am probably on some list at Anthem of "insured who call us with stupid questions", but I don't care. Words like "out-of-network", "provider", and "deductible" really make me nauseous. My life would be bliss if I didn't have to take care of these bills or even see them. While I know no one is going to deal with it, I find it odd that from the EOBs (yes, I know what that means now) we have been given from the pediatric opthamologist, anesthesiologist, and surgery center that we have been charged for pain medication three times, anesthesia twice, and who knows what else. This type of double charging has to be part of the problem. Yes, the system is messed up. Yes, it should be fixed. No, I don't know how to do this, but it seems that the overcharging is the root of much of the evil. Someone is making big bucks from charging $20 for boxes of Kleenex for every hospital room in the country. Hudson's fifteen minute surgery= $7,200. SERIOUSLY???

Perhaps I find this all to be a greater stress right now because we are also deciding on our health care plan for 2010. All premiums have sky-rocketed and making choices about whether or not we want to pay now, later, with tax-free dollars or not gives me a migraine. Here is just one of our dilemmas. Dental is a separate coverage option for us. I was told by my dentist that Hudson does not need to be seen in his office until he is at least 3. That means that we can opt out of coverage for him, right? But if anything happens to his teeth, the pediatrician will not deal with it. (She told me.) If his favorite landing pad was not his face, this would be a no-brainer; however, he is perpetually falling down and bruising up his head! What do we do?

This is what it looks like to not worry about health care:


P.S. This is just my infantile "I told you so" moment. When I took Hudson to the ped at the end of September, I lamented to her that the waiting room was an infestation of flu virus toys. Dr. Hodson said that that was not how the flu was transmitted. (?!?!) I started to question her medical know-how immediately. Well, my friend went to our ped today and guess what? All waiting room toys are gone and signs explaining this is to decrease potential infections are posted. Hmmmm... Personally, I think ped offices need to have restaurant-type buzzers so you can quickly check in and then wait in your (hopefully) virus free car instead of a elbow to elbow with kids wearing face masks.