Drs were pretty casual when mine were young.
My oldest I vaccinated very slowly.
First I allowed for her adjusted age, and I also would not take her in unless she had zero cold symptoms.
Youngest, wouldn’t sit still for her ears to be checked let alone to get a shot, so she had to catch up when she was older and better able to tolerate it.
I remember one time I took her in because I thought she had a bladder infection, but she actually had chicken pox!
We had to go out the back door,
( she was about 5)
We needed to go to the health dept for anonymous HIV testing. ( one of us had received many transfusions of blood products before testing).
Is HIV and other testing for contagious disease covered by ACA also?
I don’t think those other tests are required to be covered free of charge, but it is included with some coverage in all plans now (under laboratory services, I think). So if you have copay, deductible, etc., you still have to pay that.
HIV testing is covered by the ACA for adults considered in “risk” categories (this can be broadly defined and I’m not sure what the exact specifications are). It’s considered a preventative measure and thus free of charge.
However, that is confidential testing as opposed to anonymous. Many choose to do anonymous testing (which is readily available and free in most metropolitan areas which is where the bulk of HIV cases are) so that the HIV test is not connected to their medical records. The HIV/AIDs resources that the ACA expanded are really one of its unsung achievements, IMO.
Slightly OT but still in the realm of prevention (as this is the closest thing we have to an HIV immunization atm) University of Michigan’s insurance just started covering PREP (not, AFAIK, connected to the ACA but still a huge achievement) for high-risk individuals. PREP can cost upwards of $1800/month if bought out of pocket. With coverage, it’s only $20/month here. I sincerely hope that PREP becomes part of standard prevention treatment, with the associated cost reduction, for “at-risk” individuals.
Yes, I am vaccinated. At least against all the normal things parents vaccinate their kids for. I will give my kids all the normal vaccinations too. As I said, it’s stupid not to vaccinate your kids. It’s just not anyone’s call except the parent’s themselves.
Only if this weren’t a non-controversial issue. Once support for mandating vaccinations reaches some critical point it may end up becoming mandated. If popular opinion is against mandating vaccinations it won’t be mandated.
Our oldest 3 had chickenpox before the vaccine was available; the youngest was fortunate to get the vaccination. The oldest 2 had a very mild case- just a few blisters and very mild symptoms. Now, 26 years later, one of them just had a battery of medical tests and was told she does not have any immunity to chicken pox. She is getting the vaccination.
I had Shingles last year and just paid to get a vaccination. My insurance only covers it at age 60. I had it on my face and in my eye and it was horrible. I have a pretty high pain tolerance but the pain was constant and intense for about 4 days and then leveled off to a more bearable level. I caught it quickly and took meds but it was bad. I missed 4 weeks of work- couldn’t go back til the sores scabbed over but I looked so bad I don’t think I would have gone anyway. My face and eye swelled. I still have a few spots that are very sensitive and it has been a year now. I am a huge advocate for the vaccination, even if you have to pay.
Vlad, if outbreaks like the one occurring in California now aren’t reason enough to mandate vaccines, what is?
We could adopt the same casual attitude about all sorts of things and never agree on what constitutes “critical.” Take speed limits. Why not do away with them and leave it to individuals to determine their level of risk? Obviously the reason is that there would be too much collateral damage in a short time. We can’t as a society allow personal “rights” to trump the collective good as it has been largely defined.
The ACA does NOT guarantee free vaccines for children. Our health insurance changed last year and D3 wasn’t covered for her pre-college vaccines because our pediatrician was now considered out-of-network.
I argued with them for a while but the loophole is there and the business offices will know it and bill you accordingly.
The ACA itself doesn’t cover anything. It does require that vaccinations be covered if you go to in-network provider. It is in no way an ACA issue if you decided to go to a doctor not in your insurance network. That isn’t an ACA issue… or a “billing loophole”. Regarding birth control pills, I am curious about your comment. If you are at your “in-network” pharmacy, are they still not free? Or is this only an issue if you go to a pharmacy that your insurance doesn’t cover? Just like doctors, no all pharmacies are covered under all insurance plans.
I would assume, given that vaccines now ARE covered for in-network patients and millions more people have insurance coverage that the percentage of vaccinated children will hopefully increase.
But vaccines are covered and it really isn’t all that complicated.
The vast majority of people use an in-network doctor because out-of-network providers are almost always much, MUCH more expensive. So, people use in-network doctors where vaccines are covered OR they go to an alternative place where vaccines are covered if they insist on continuing to use an out-of-network provider.
Right now the vast majority of people have no idea what’s going on with the ACA and that includes the doctors. And, no not all birth control is free at every pharmacy. And, there were always programs providing free vaccinations so I’m not sure about expecting any big changes in vaccination rates. Also, most people objecting or refusing to vaccinate are not poor, quite the opposite, actually. But, they don’t trust the vaccines. ACA will not fix that at all.
Perhaps a credible threat of the human species. Though at that point I don’t think there will be people who refuse the vaccine.
If it were up to me I’d do away with speed limits on highways and freeways where there’s no pedestrian traffic. Elsewhere, there’s a big difference between expecting people to drive slower than they want, and asking people to inject something into their bodies they don’t want.
Many Drs are out of network unfortunately.
Even though I live in the 23rd most populous city in the US, for some specialties, there may be only a couple Drs in network and they may still require driving thirty miles.
Makes it hard for people without transportation.
Where D is living now, they only have traveling Drs, who come to the next town (15 miles away) a few times a month, or you can go to the bigger town (100 miles away). You are more likely to find a network provider in the larger town At least they have a hospital with almost two hundred beds.
Using network provider isn’t always an option. http://health.usnews.com/health-news/hospital-of-tomorrow/articles/2014/04/10/hospitals-get-the-squeeze-from-insurers-narrow-networks
Marie, in post 1151, I’m quite sure that most clinic billing offices are VERY clear on what’s covered under an individual’s insurance policy, and if they’re not, they can call for authorization. People seem to think that the ACA is some sort of government program, when in fact it’s simply a law that mandates that PRIVATE for-profit insurance companies must provide coverage under certain conditions. It’s a HUGE giveaway to the private health insurance business and I can’t imagine why anyone (much less “pro-business” politicians) would oppose requiring that ten million more people BUY a product.
Okay, I didn’t say anything about clinic billing offices at all but rather doctors. However, it has not been my experience that the billing offices are clear, either. Many have no clue what networks they are in and it could change next week. And, I have actually had someone say to me that when they make authorization calls they routinely get different answers. There are lots of good and varying reasons for anyone including pro-business politicians to oppose requiring people to buy any product though, but that is a different discussion. My real point here is that ACA has nothing to do with people not getting shots since most people who choose not to get shots, don’t want shots. It’s a choice.
In my experience, medical billing is complex, byzantine, and often contradictory. Of course that has nothing to do with the ACA and was not made worse by it. *
For both my older daughters, it was a specific type/brand of birth control pills that were more costly with the same doctor’s prescription and the same pharmacy being used.
*I’ve been sent bills a year late. I’ve paid bills and had to walk to the billing office with a cancelled check to prove I did so. Luckily the billing office was not in a different state. I’ve paid bills and had to send a photo of a cancelled check with the words, “hey it looks like you guys endorsed this, not me”, after they threatened to take me for court. I’ve gone without asthma medicine for months, getting hoarser and hoarser sounding, because they wouldn’t let me pay the $500 they charged for a 3-month supply of medicine, saying it was too high. I was willing to pay it! My daughter went to the ER once because her medication had been cancelled because they had called my house with a question about dosage (not calling the doctor or patient), didn’t get an answer, didn’t leave a message, so they just cancelled it and she found out when she couldn’t pick up a refill and went into withdrawals. Yes, anything goes with medical billing! (I admit, that last example didn’t have to do with billing)
Because if you want to convince people to vaccinate, you have to understand the reasons why they don’t. I understand people who believe the government and medical community have sometimes acted irresponsibly. Look up eugenics in the US and you’ll find a program that was instituted ‘for the public good’ that turned out to be not so good for thousands upon thousand of Americans. It doesn’t mean I agree with their conclusions, but I understand why they’ve reached them.
History can be useful in educating people about why vaccinations are important. If someone is fearful of the vaccines and mistrustful of the authorities I suppose you can try to coerce them to immunize their children, but I fail to see how threatening to refuse them access to medical care (like an earlier poster suggested) is going to convince them that you have their best interests in mind. My mother once said that the reason many people don’t immunize, in her opinion, is because they’ve forgotten history. They didn’t grow up with classmates whose siblings had died or been permanently disabled by these diseases and they didn’t experience the relief when it was announced that scientists had been successful in finding something to prevent them, so they don’t dread these diseases the way our parents and grandparents did. However, if we understand the reasons why they’re fearful we can educate them. And I prefer to educate people so they act out of knowledge, not fear.
And each vaccine needs to be considered separately, imo.
For instance, if you have a large unimmunized population, some diseases will become much more opportunistic and mutate to take advantage of that, making the vaccines much less effective.
That might be an angle worth looking at.
But I have a question if we have any epidemiologist playing at home.
I don’t get a flu shot, possibly because I don’t get the flu.
Can I be a carrier of the flu without symptoms?