Affordable Care Act / Sacramento Chiropractor Recommendations

by Gregg Anderson.

I hope you are having a great year so far.  It seems everyone is talking about the Affordable Care Act aka “ObamaCare.” There is a lot of confusion and uncertainty. The bottom line is that we all want access to quality health care, and to have it be affordable. Better yet – what if we get and stay so healthy that we don’t need too much help from doctors and hospitals?  It's cheaper, safer and a whole lot more fun!

For years I have used a little play on words with Health “Assurance” vs Health "Insurance."  Since 1996, I have personally bought high-deductible health insurance and have used the tax-deductible Health Savings Account to pay for the thankfully minimal medical health care my family has needed.  We also use it for dental care.

It has always made sense to do all I can to stay healthy, so no matter what is covered or not covered by my insurance, I’m not needing it!  

I hope to inspire you to become more interested in taking more personal responsibility for your health as you age.  If you do, you may gain some reasonable health assurance and not need to rely too much on your health insurance. 

The results of a series of studies by the Harvard public health expert, David Eisenberg that were published in the Journal of the American Medical Association revealed that Americans are pursuing alternative health care options quite vigorously.  The study revealed that in 1997, there were as many as 243 million more visits made annually by Americans to “alternative health care providers” than to traditional medical doctors.  While chiropractic makes up the majority, they also include acupuncture, massage therapy, herbs and others.  

Americans, especially the well-educated and baby boomers, are becoming much more pro-active with their health.  They are giving themselves some reasonable health assurance and not relying on their health insurance when it comes to optimizing health. This assurance comes from choosing behaviors, products and services that enhance ones health, instead of relying on one's HMO or worse yet, the government to take care of them.   What’s interesting is that even the simple basic chiropractic care that Medicare provides, is proving to be a very worthwhile expenditure of Medicare dollars.

A study entitled, “Utilization, Costs, and Effects of Chiropractic Care on Medicare Program Costs,” compared the global, per capita Medicare expenditures of chiropractic patients, to those of non-chiropractic patients.  Its results are very encouraging and should inspire more of you to give chiropractic services a try. 

According to the American Chiropractic Association, the executive summary of the study states, “The results strongly suggest that chiropractic care significantly reduces the beneficiary costs to the Medicare program.  The study also suggests that chiropractic services could play a role in reducing costs of any Medicare reform and/or a new prescription drug benefit.”  

Specifically, the study found that beneficiaries who received chiropractic care had lower average Medicare payments for all Medicare services than those who did not ($4,426 vs. $8,103).  In addition, the chiropractic patients averaged fewer claims as well as lower average Medicare payments.

The costs are only half of the big picture.  What is really encouraging is that the Medicare chiropractic patients evidently felt so good and were having so much fun that they must have plain forgot to get sick, go the doctor and take their pills!  They are taking “Just Say No” to the next level.

I still occasionally hear people make the excuse of not enjoying the benefits of chiropractic care because it’s not a covered benefit by their insurance or they quit care when the insurance quits paying.   I once heard a lecture on the history and origins of the insurance industry.  Insurance was never meant to maintain us.  It has always existed in case of a crisis; the ship sank, the house burned down, the car crashed, etc.  For example, when you pull your car into Jiffy Lube for maintenance, do you ask them to bill it to Safeco?  Or when your house needs paint, do you call your homeowner’s agent?  No way, he’d think you were nuts! 

You must make the choice to pay for it, knowing how important it is to maintain the valuable things in your life.  Without a doubt, the more time and money you devote to pro-active choices to restore and maintain good function, the more assurance you will have for a long, healthy, enjoyable life. 

This last part here is for you who are relatively healthy, want to stay that way, are not yet ready for Medicare, and are paying your own health insurance premiums.  As far as I know, the ACA still law allows you to set up a Health Savings Account (HSA). With a HSA, the dollars deposited into your account are not taxed up to a generous maximum per year.  They don’t “go away” like the employer-based flexible spending accounts if you don’t spend them by the end of the year.  In addition, dollars spent on allowable health care expenses, like chiropractic care, are not taxed either.  It’s a great deal. 

To be eligible, you must have a higher deductible, HSA eligible, health insurance plan.  With the HSA, it is a good gamble if you are healthy, and rarely go to the doctor.  By placing more risk and responsibility back on yourself, you save a significant amount of dollars on insurance premiums.  In my own case, I save over $700 per month.  The saved dollars can go into the HSA.  In less than a year, you can have enough dollars in your HSA to pay your deductible, if necessitated by a crisis. 

Experts in the insurance industry are concerned that healthy people will realize that they may not need the high premium, low deductible plans, and shift their dollars away from the large pool of premium money.  By contributing to this large pool, healthy folks that never go to the doctor are essentially subsidizing the care of the sicker folks who do.  Now that is noble of you, if that is your mission.  Just know that you can now shift the dollars you have been spending on high premium, low-deductible plans, essentially over-insuring yourself, to a pool of dollars (HSA) that are earmarked specifically for you.  It is advisable to meet with your insurance broker and your tax professional to get the details.   I hope you have a great month!  

*The content of this blog are the opinion of the writer, who is not a licensed insurance broker or expert on the ACA. Food for thought only.