Email or username:

Password:

Forgot your password?
Lance R. Vick's posts Post Back to profile
Top-level
Penguin

@neilk @lrvick @BenAveling @Jennifer I’m old but was a software engineer for Apple products so live on my iPhone (like now). But parents & in-laws could never use any mobile phone, either to keep it charged or dial with the tiny keypad, much less use a smartphone. Medical providers have to accommodate such people, or tell the world they’re not going to care for elderly people 🙁

12 March at 9:53 | Wall-to-wall | Open on twit.social
7 comments
toadjaune

@PenguinToot @neilk @lrvick @BenAveling @Jennifer
wondering if that's part of the point.

I'm assuming elderly people are more expensive customers, as a health provider. From a stricly financial point of view, a measure that allows you to discriminate them while calling it a technical limitation sounds quite tempting.

(no idea whether it's legal or not anywhere, tho, but it's certainly very questionable ethically)

12 March at 12:10 | Open on hostux.social
RealGene ☣️

@PenguinToot @neilk @lrvick @BenAveling @Jennifer
And so you've accidentally stumbled upon the actual reason.

No medicine-for-profit company wants old people with their measly Medicare reimbursements and lots of chronic illnesses. Better to get the cases of tennis elbow paid for by employer plans.

If they can be made to exit the rolls simply by requiring use of a mobile phone, that's cost savings that goes right to the CEO's Ivory Backscratcher fund.

12 March at 13:07 | Open on mastodon.online
Bob K Mertz

@RealGene
I really had the feeling this was a result of the medical company just wanting to be able to make advertising money off of their patients in addition to their fees and insurance billing but this actually seems very plausible. Perhaps it's both.

Both probably are factors in this move. The only thing for certain is that medical care is not at all about care anymore.
@PenguinToot @neilk @lrvick @BenAveling @Jennifer

12 March at 16:24 | Open on techhub.social
Penguin

@RealGene @neilk @lrvick @BenAveling @Jennifer Daughter works for her state health insurers, visits lonely elderly to be sure they’re getting medical care, phones physicians as necessary to arrange visits, etc. But she’s one of few people who do this, clearly more will be needed as the population ages. At least Medicare is functioning for her clients.

12 March at 21:28 | Open on twit.social
DELETED

@RealGene
If this were so, all they would have to do is stop providing Medicare coverage which would pose no legal roadblocks but I guarandamntee you that health plans make plenty of $$ from Medicare. Also, no indication that the original poster is a senior.
Would insurance providers prefer to ONLY insure well people and be allowed to drop them if they got sick... Yep. That's a HUGE reason we need the ACA.
Ins providers don't care about you.
@PenguinToot @neilk @lrvick @BenAveling @Jennifer

14 March at 3:08 | Open on masto.nu
This Old Hiker

@neilk @PenguinToot @BenAveling @lrvick @Jennifer I’m sure that they consider dumping elderly and indigent patients a feature, and not a bug.

12 March at 13:36 | Open on ohai.social
burne

@PenguinToot @neilk @lrvick @BenAveling @Jennifer The thing is.. your medical insurers are in it for the profit and nothing else. Over here there is a legal requirement to provide insurance to everybody, and thus to accomodate people who can't or won't use smart phones. They cannot refuse people or pre-existing conditions or for (for instance) a condition that makes using a smartphone impossible, like old age or beginning dementia.

12 March at 20:29 | Open on waag.social
Go Up