In a perfect world wouldn't there be a central data base anyway? WHOA, what a can of worms would that open up!!!!
I am afraid that is where things are headed. After being on social security disability for 24 months I was forced to take Medicare, my insurance company could finally dump my pre-existing conditions and me legally because Medicare was available for me to purchase. I found out that every medical/mental provider, even those that do not take Medicare patients know that I am on Medicare. Shouldn't I have the right to go to a non Medicare provider and privately pay for a medical or mental service? No can do. Medicare owns my body and mind now.
I can elect to go off of Medicare, as it is all or nothing. I can't obtain insurance because of my pre-existing conditions. I can't purchase insurance under the Affordable Health Care Act because I qualify for Medicare. I am not wealthy, so need insurance, therefore Medicare owns me. I would not have thought about others knowing about me if not for the fact that I don't think my current mental health care professional is as good as my prior one was.
My prior therapist, Alice, had a terrible accident and had to retire
She was my therapist for 18 months before I became a Medicare patient and she accepted Medicare as well as my prior insurance. After she retired there was only one other mental health professional in an office of 20+ that accepted Medicare patients. I have been conducting a search for a new mental health care professional and the choices are few and far between. I knew not all medical providers take Medicare patients. I found out that if you want to go see a provider that does not take Medicare as a "self paying" patient, you can not. Even if you LIE and tell them you have no insurance they will find out you are on Medicare and can not accept you because they will get in major trouble. I don't know what that trouble is. I think it is some where between a fine, loosing their licenses to practice and GITMO, lol.
Seriously folks, Medicare is different than private insurance. One more fun factoid. The reimbursement to Mental Health Professionals for treating Medicare patients, which include those that are disabled due to mental health reasons, is $57.50 and hour which I think is 45 or 50 minutes. That rate has not changed in something like 20 years. Hopefully someone here who knows more about this will correct me if I am wrong. The $57.50 is 100% of which Medicare pays 80% and the patient or their secondary insurance pays the other 20%. This is low.
Some of you will think $57.50 is a lot but it isn't. Rent, telephones, computers, the required medical software, malpractice insurance and on and on and on is expensive. Why will, in the case of Mental Health professionals, a practice use those resources to generate $57.50 per hour when they can get $90+ from insurance companies for licensed mental health therapists. I don't know what the reimbursement is for the Mental Health Doctors, that is probably higher but it could be the same, the doctors in that practice do not take Medicare either.
When we hear our public officials talk about how the state of mental health care in the country, think of those that receive.
When you complain about your insurance, maybe you will enjoy it more as all medical professionals in the country do not know about your business. If I wasn't in chronic pain and I wasn't disabled with fibromyalgia, etc. I would get a grass roots movement going to improve mental health reimbursements and mental care for those on Medicare, Medicaid and people needing it. We have thrown people out on the streets with pills for too many years.
While it might be more efficient to have a common medical data base - I disagree. We all know or know about jerk doctors that we or others have had to fire. Do we want their impressions or lies about us recorded in our permanent data file? I can see it now. Hearings and more administrative red tape to have our medical records corrected, who will run this? An extended branch of Medicare? Just say NO!
End Rant