| There is a federal law that requires insurance companies to report settlements in malpractice cases to a federally funded data bank, but the public has little access to this information. Many hospitals have avoided even this reporting requirement by removing the doctor's name from the malpractice lawsuit. This secrecy is systemic, and it works to protect bad doctors and bad drugs, just as today's medical industry has shown it prefers.
But there is one system, woefully underfunded and weak, that collects deaths and injuries from prescription drugs. |
| PharMetrics said its database of personal medical histories, including prescriptions, diagnoses, hospitalizations, and lab tests, had been obtained from insurance companies, pharmacies, and other medical providers. The firm said its data did not include names and addresses, but such information was easy to obtain.
The drug companies had also begun collecting the private data directly from Americans through what some executives called one-on-one relationship marketing. To do this, the marketers created websites to attract people looking for health information. |
David Steinman
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 While global warming may not be the sole cause of the extreme number of hurricanes in 2005, a growing number of insurance companies have come to the conclusion that climate change, caused mainly by human activity, could well increase the intensity of hurricanes and other weather disasters. This also has insurers extremely concerned. No amount of money is available now to deal with another hurricane season like 2005 when the Gulf Coast flooded and we lost major portions of New Orleans. |
Abram Hoffer, PhD, MD, FRCP(C) and Dr. Jonathan Prousjy, DPHE, DSC, ND, FRSH
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 Insurance companies, governments and citizens are the people that pay medical bills and they are the ones that can benefit from lower health care costs. We as health professionals and concerned citizens must continue to encourage our politicians to take a more active role in Health Maintenance."
This is not a new call to action. In the 1950s, Dr T.D. |
Joe Graedon, M.S. and Teresa Graedon, Ph.D.
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 Insurance companies may deny you affordable access to drugs like Allegra now that loratadine is available OTC. Loratadine may cause sedation and impair driving in susceptible people. Do not assume you are safe behind the wheel.
Cost: Approximately $5 to $10 for a month's supply when purchased generically in bulk. The brand-name Claritin can cost two to four times that much. difficulty is that people are notoriously bad at assessing their level of impairment. |
Jay Joseph
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 The categories used in the DSM are accepted by most official organizations including hospitals, insurance companies, and other institutions.
Dual MatingStudy. A study assessing the prevalence of a disorder among the biological offspring of two parents diagnosed with the same disorder.
Endophenotype (Biological Marker). A genetically-based neurobiological observable trait related to the assumed or proven molecular genetic basis of a disorder. |
Mike Adams, the Health Ranger
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 Thus, doctors' offices and hospitals have to employ entire armies of people to sit around and reclassify procedures in ways that can get paid by insurance companies, Medicare and Medicaid. It's a massive waste of time, money and effort.
In the U.S. healthcare system, it's a paperwork nightmare. And there is a paperwork war taking place. All of this is a result of health insurance, both taxpayer-funded health insurance and private health insurance. |
Mary-Ann Shearer
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 It irritated the hell out of me that I was penalized for having high blood pressure by the insurance companies when I was trying to take out coverage for my young family! Anyway, life goes on, and I had to live with the fact that every time I had my blood pressure taken, it was elevated for my age group and weight, and that there was nothing I, nor anyone else, could do about it—or so I thought.
Well, if you, too, believe that there are no solutions to these problems, let me tell you that you are wrong. |
Michael T. Murray
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 Eventually the insurance companies will figure it out and insulin pens will be as popular here as they are elsewhere in the world.
Use of an insulin pen or pump requires the user to recognize factors that may cause a change in their blood sugar levels (see Table 8.3).
Table 8.3. |
Sue Palmer
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 But some insurance companies have exploited the possibility that there miaht, so the health and safety lobby grows ever stronger... and our children grow ever weaker.
And it's not just physical development that's threatened by the changes in society's attitude to PE. As well as promoting physical control and coordination, sporting activities - particularly team games - have always been valued for their contribution to children's social and emotional growth. |
Fred A. Baughman, Jr., M.D. and Craig Hovey
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 The explanation is simple: schools, pharmaceutical companies, medical professionals, and insurance companies like the drugs they profit from and cast them in a positive light accordingly. The pushers who lie beyond the bus loop barricades provide them no profits, even when their wares are very similar. |
Bruce H. Lipton
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 It is true that because half of Americans visit complementary health practitioners, traditional doctors can no longer put their heads in the sand and hope other approaches go away. insurance companies have even
Mammogram. Note the above illustration is not a photograph of abreast, it is an electronic image created from scanning the radiant energy characteristics of the organ's cells and tissues. Differentials in the energy spectra enable radiologists to distinguish between healthy and diseased tissues (the black spot in the center). |
Fred A. Baughman, Jr., M.D. and Craig Hovey
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| They are easy to administer, take little time and effort, cost insurance companies less money, and don't require anybody to really get to know a child well enough to figure out what's bothering her and what to do about it. Naturally, pharmaceutical companies spend billions to convince parents, educators, and health care professionals that the drugs are superior. Why talk to children about their problems when drugs will damp down the symptoms?
An adult can say no to a drug that is hurting her and walk away. |
Dr. Timothy Scott
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 Allowing drugs to be approved based on 4-, 6- or 8-week studies needs to come to an end.
(4) insurance companies will establish an "approved drug list" which demands that drugs meet the standards that the FDA should be requiring. This is already happening to some extent. Eli Lilly's Cymbalta antidepressant was disqualified from appearing on Kaiser Permanente's preferred drugs list for Northern and Southern California because it has not been found superior to the off-patent Prozac. |
Fred A. Baughman, Jr., M.D. and Craig Hovey
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| It is the schools that post signs saying they are "drug free zones," the health care professionals who make livings by tarring kids with bogus labels, the insurance companies who view drug treatments as more cost-effective, the pharmaceutical companies who make billions by making poisons appear as safe, and lots more beneficial, than Flintstone vitamins. The most effective drug pushers are the legal ones.
Chapter Two
MAKING MONKEYS illions of people in New Delhi, India, and the surrounding area were swept up in a panic during the spring of 2001. What were they afraid of? |
Peter Radetsky
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 Because, candidly, insurance companies don't like paying for people sitting around in the hospital not doing anything. You're treating them, you truly are, but the insurance companies don't recognize that. You have to be doing something to patients — giving them an IV, for example. Then insurance companies will say, 'Well, sure, they have to be in the hospital to get an IV, that's fair.' But an IV may not be the best thing for them at all. It's quite ridiculous."
During the fasting-de-masking period, as the body clears itself, patients may literally go through withdrawal. |
Fred A. Baughman, Jr., M.D. and Craig Hovey
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| For we are swept up in our own hoax, one that has lasted many years and becomes steadily worse as trusted health and educational professionals, the media, pharmaceutical companies, insurance companies, and frightened parents fuel it. Compared with what we are engaged in, the Monkey Man scare was a little hiccup of a fright that was soon squelched by reason. If only we were so rational. |
Peter Rost
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 And it is a pretty good system for hospitals, insurance companies, and others that deliver healthcare services. Americans spend about twice as much per person for healthcare as do Canadians, Japanese, or Europeans, according to the World Health Organization. But it's not a good system for
American citizens. The U.S. has shorter life expectancies and higher infant and child mortality rates than Canada, Japan, and all of Western Europe except Portugal, according to the WHO.
Our dirty little secret is that the drug industry already sells its products, right here in the U.S. |
Fred A. Baughman, Jr., M.D. and Craig Hovey
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| Insurance companies, who typically pay a physician for no more than 15 minutes of their time to evaluate a child for ADHD, save money when drugs like Adderall and Ritalin are prescribed instead of delving into a more labor-intensive examination of what the real home or school problems might be.
None of the above parties intentionally harm children, though they consistently deny or ignore the harm their actions cause, yet the sum of their actions add up to child abuse on a massive scale. And what of the parents who go along? For the most part, they are trying to be as responsible as possible. |
Jacky Law
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 Even if they had taken out private policies, there were limits to what they could have because insurance companies were also being squeezed.
The growth in markets for broad-brush medicine during the 1990s was felt most keenly by the elderly, many of whom were having to choose between food and medicine. There were stories of the elderly signing up in droves for special bus tours to Canada or Mexico to benefit from their state-controlled drug prices. |
James F. Balch, M.D. and Mark Stengler, N.D.
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 Today, acupuncture and acupressure have gained widespread use in the West, even gaining the blessing of some insurance companies.
No other medical system in the world has the same wealth of historical experience to draw upon. And although many Western observers find the symbolic nature of TCM too fanciful, we are drawn back to Chinese medicine because of its repeatedly proven ability to heal the sick and keep the healthy well. |
Mike Adams, the Health Ranger
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 Health insurance companies and HMOs: They pretend to offer coverage for health costs, but in reality, they are largely in the business of denying coverage and thus limiting payouts while driving health clinics to the brink of bankruptcy due to late payments.
Medical journals: They pretend to be the gatekeepers of scientific truth, but in reality most are for-profit publications that predominantly print pro-drug articles. By sheer coincidence, most medical journals are also largely funded by drug money (advertising dollars from drug companies). |
Kevin Trudeau
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 Fear of influenza deaths in numbers similar to the 1918 flu epidemic led to a recommendation that the federal government vaccinate all Americans. When insurance companies refused to provide coverage to the vaccine manufacturers, the government agreed to accept liability for claims of adverse events. This obstacle having been cleared, the National Influenza Immunization Program (NIIP) officially started in October of 1976. |
Joe Graedon, M.S. and Teresa Graedon, Ph.D.
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| Insurance companies and "mangled care organizations" may not be thrilled at the prospect of paying a psychologist or psychiatrist $100 to $200 a week to do counseling for several months. The bean counters seem to prefer paying for prescription drugs indefinitely. What is so bizarre about this ass-backwards approach is that psychotherapy can enhance the effectiveness of medications and can be stopped once it has been successful. That seems cost-effective to us. |
Phyllis A. Balch, CNC
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 Most insurance companies now honor claims for these special light boxes.
Q Atypical depression is a common but often undiagnosed disorder affecting up to 40 million Americans. Although classification is still ongoing, it could arguably be thought of as a subset of bipolar depression. Symptoms include mood swings, carbohydrate cravings, weight gain, sensitivity to rejection, and lethargy. In a recent study, daily supplementation with chromium picolinate reduced the symptoms significantly, especially the carbohydrate cravings. No side effects were observed that were different from placebo. |
| Insurance companies should be encouraged to provide breast-feeding services and supplies as part of coverage policies.
Q There are resources available to help women learn to breast-feed successfully and overcome any problems that arise. Certified lactation consultants are practitioners who specialize in this area. Your health care provider or the facility where you give birth should be able to give you a referral.
Q La Leche League is another valuable resource for the breast-feeding mother. |
Joe Graedon, M.S. and Teresa Graedon, Ph.D.
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| The guidelines we used are certainly different from those used by many insurance companies, the FDA, and HMOs, none of which believe there is a problem when NTI drugs are dispensed generically. We always believe in erring on the side of caution, however. In our opinion, these medications are safest when they come from a single manufacturer. If you can afford the brand-name drugs or your insurance company will spring for them, we think that is the way to go. |
Phyllis A. Balch, CNC
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| Some health insurance companies cover the cost of herbal medicines when they are prescribed by health care professionals. The Office of Alternative Medicine, part of the National Institutes of Health, is funding research on herbal remedies. According to an article published in USA Today, nearly 50 million Americans regularly use herbal supplements.
Herbal supplements are not subject to the same standards as are prescription and over-the-counter drugs. This is one of the main criticisms of this type of supplement. |
| This treatment is very expensive, however; it can cost more than $100,000, and many insurance companies are reluctant to pay for it because they consider it experimental. It is also extremely difficult physically for the woman who undergoes it. This is a risky procedure, and it is still widely considered experimental, although many women with late-stage breast cancer are hoping that it will be able to help them in their battle. |
Mike Adams, the Health Ranger
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| Many hospitals realize they won't be paid much for your procedure because of all the paperwork shuffling and the late payments by insurance companies and Medicare. So they have no incentive to have more patients come in with low-quality insurance. And besides, they've probably got patients coming in through the door every single day anyway, so there's really no incentive to give you an outstanding, positive experience. At least it's not the same incentive offered by these outsourced, offshore medical facilities that base their very existence on reputation and word of mouth. |
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