United States Hospitals

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United States Hospitals

by beater » Mon Feb 16, 2009 7:36 am
United States Hospitals have traditionally relied primarily on revenues from paying patients to offset losses from unreimbursed care. Almost all paying patients now rely on governmental or private health insurance to pay hospital bills. Recently, insurers have been strictly limiting what they pay hospitals for the care of insured patients to amounts at or below actual costs.

Which of the following conclusions is best supported by the information above?

(A) Although the advance of technology has made expensive medical procedures available to the wealthy, such procedures are out of the reach of low-income patients.
(B) If hospitals do not find ways of raising additional income for unreimbursed care, they must either deny some of that care or suffer losses if they give it.
(C) Some patients have incomes too high for eligibility for governmnetal health insurance but are unable to afford private insurance for hospital care.
(D) If the hospitals reduce ther costs in providing care, insurance companies will maintain the current level of reimbursement, thereby providing more funds for unreimbursed care.
(E) Even though philanthropic donations have traditionally provided some support for the the hospitals, such donations are at present declining.

B
Last edited by beater on Mon Feb 16, 2009 2:04 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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by bmlaud » Mon Feb 16, 2009 9:41 am
IMO B

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by nervesofsteel » Mon Feb 16, 2009 11:37 am
yes should be B

if insurance companies don't pay heavily... then hospitals will suffer losses

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by Bidisha_800 » Mon Feb 16, 2009 12:38 pm
(B)
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by beater » Mon Feb 16, 2009 2:03 pm
What is your reasoning for not selecting D

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by Musicolo » Mon Feb 16, 2009 5:01 pm
I would also go for B.

The reason I would not go for D is because the current level of reimbursement by the insurance companies can not provide hospitals with funds for reimbursed care. Its contradictory.

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by xcobrax » Thu Aug 19, 2010 8:34 pm
Musicolo wrote:I would also go for B.

The reason I would not go for D is because the current level of reimbursement by the insurance companies can not provide hospitals with funds for reimbursed care. Its contradictory.
I think that comparison was not necessarily meant to say if costs go down then insurance companies will pay more, but rather that if costs go down, there will be more money to allocate for unreimbursed care.

I would rule out D because it says "will maintain" (assuming something about the insurance company)

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by sashish007 » Fri Mar 25, 2011 2:24 am
at the outset, D looks out of scope as it talks about what a hypothetical situation (when hospitals reduce costs) would result in.

otherwise, D only SEEMS to imply that hospitals may save money, but then in a way it contradicts the statement in the stimulus that says that insurance cos. have been limiting what they pay these hospitals to amounts less than or equal to the ACTUAL costs.

reducing the costs DOES NOT guarantee (or at least the stimulus doesn't say so) if the cos. WILL MAINTAIN the current level of reimbursement, because if they reduce the payments to match the lowered costs, then hospitals will not have funds for unreimbursed care -- D contradicts this fact!
Ashish
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