by Anne Harding
posted by Jameel Murray
NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - As the U.S. continues to watch Congress thrash out a plan to try to cover those without health insurance, a new study shows that people admitted to the hospital for trauma are almost twice as likely to die from their injuries if they are uninsured.
A co-author of the study said she and her colleagues weren't surprised at the disparity they found, but they were surprised by how large it turned out to be. "Our hope is that people recognize that the results from this study are to be taken seriously," Dr. Heather Rosen of Harvard Medical School in Boston told Reuters Health via E-mail. "Being uninsured is a major detriment to one's health, which has been shown in multiple studies addressing hospital admission, treatment, screening, outcomes, and aftercare."Adults with no health insurance are at 25 percent greater risk of dying from any cause in a given time period than are their insured peers, Rosen and her colleagues note in their report in the Archives of Surgery. Even though the Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act-also known as the "anti-dumping law"-mandates that no hospital or ambulance service receiving federal funds turn away patients based on their ability to pay, Rosen and her team still suspected that mortality would still be higher after traumatic injury for uninsured patients.
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Interesting article. People should be worried if they are uninsure. The costs of health care here is very expensive. I think everyone weights cost and benefit when making decision. If they don't have insurance and something happens, too bad but it's the cost you have to pay.
ReplyDeleteQuang Nguyen
This is very interesting. I think this article goes back to how people overestimate their chances of having good things happen and underestimate the chances of really bad things happening. This is why it is best not to save on things such as health insurance since the statistics show that having insurance is so important. - Jonathan Tse
ReplyDeleteEveryone should be covered with insurance. It seems guilty if hospital cannot receive the one without ability to pay off the fee, and let him die.
ReplyDeleteShawn Gao