Wilmont Kreis
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The Bard
1703 or 1704???
The long march
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Who/What? Is Andrew?
The Raid
Amazon.com
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Old Deerfield Road
Now available in Print and Kindle on Amazon.com
St. Clair Flats
Tecumseh
Father Gabriel Richard
Woodward's plan for new Detroit
Seal of Detroit
Sacagawea's Child
Toussaint Charbonneau
Route of Lewis and Clark
Statue of Antoine Cadillac, Detroit
Lewis and Clark Journal
Book Five
Picnics
Hamtramck takes control of Detroit for America
Anthony Wayne
Battle of Saratoga
Brown's Tavern on Harsens Island
Chief Pontiac
The St. Clair Flats, Lake St. Clair
Voyageurs route west
Old Detroit seen from across the Detroit River
Niagara Falls
Detroit Public Library home of Burton Collection
Old Detroit seen from across the Detroit River
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The Maroon Bells
The walk to Longshot
The stack from hell
Sleeping Ariadne
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The most expensive route
THE HOOK
HEALTHCARE FINANCE FOR DUMMIES
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COMING SOON!
Old Citadel of Quebec
General Braddock
Forks of the Ohio River
Michigan Habitant Heritage
Vérendrye monument
Pierre Roy
Pontiac
Book Three: Peace and War
Detroit today
LaSalle's Boat: The Griffin
Replica of old Fort Michillimackinac today. Mackinac Bridge came later.
Antoine Cadillac
Charlesbourg, Quebec St. Charles de Bromee Cemetery Today
Book Five: The City in the Wilderness
Relations of the Jesuits
Jesuits in Quebec
Henri
The Allards Book Two: The Hunter
Opiates can ruin lives
Coming Next The Pain Doc
An old home near the Cass Corridor that gave me the inspiration for the Tower Light Mission.
Detroit Public Library, Main Branch
Department of Justice
Hilberry Theater on Wayne State University campus
A treasure on the Cass Corridor
From the Cass Corridor
The Corridor
Book Seven: The Witch
Book Eight: The Chief
Francois* Allard
Quebec City
Detroit Public Library, Main Branch
Driving force of New France - The beaver
Winter in Quebec
Madeleine de Roybon with the Filles de Roi
Les Filles de Roi
Artanne sur Indre: Church and Abbey
Artannes sur Indre
Filles de Roi in 1667
Here is an idealized painting of Les Filles du Roi arriving in Quebec.
Cliffs of Etretat, last view of France as Francois sails to the New World.
Charnel house and old plague cemetery, Rouen, Normandie, France.
Researching in Blacqueville
Amazon.com
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FeedbackMarch 30, 2014
Recently I asked for feedback on how people viewed their healthcare. I appreciated the large input. I noticed most comments were negative and the big winners were high deductibles, loss of or no coverage, and abundance of red tape. I will have some thoughts on solutions next.
Healthcare solutionsMarch 27, 2014
The healthcare consumer must have some role as payer. Deductibles are flawed because they severely dissuade patients from initiating care. Sometimes this is something serious which will become much more expensive as time goes on. Co-pays are a great idea when somewhat tied to ability to pay. It makes you think about decisions like going to the doctor, or worse, the ER for a very minor problem. It also makes you consider whether an inexpensive proven treatment is as good as the outrageously costly new, less tried alternative.
Too complicatedMarch 24, 2014
In summary, the healthcare system has become cumbersome to the point of being dysfunctional. Our proposed new system, which I originally endorsed, will clearly not solve things. As it is now it is also overly complicated with too many moving parts. There is clearly no perfect solution, but we can do better. More next time.
The pot grows biggerMarch 14, 2014
When Medicare and Medicaid arrived, the pot became much larger, and possibilities to increase income improved. Read my three books THE CORRIDOR, THE PAIN DOC, AND THE LABYRINTH for great examples. At the same time, the insurers and now the government began to fight back with deductibles, co-pays, and piles of bureaucracy and paper work. When I first entered practice the three-man group had all the billing done by one part time employee armed with a pencil and a pad of bills. Now such a practice might have four or more full time people with computers to do the same work. This type of inefficiency has invaded every corner of medicine.
"Gaming" the systemMarch 11, 2014
Insurance companies were very clever, but in general physicians are a very intelligent group. They would not be where they are today if this was not so. New ideas to “game” the system arrived, creative billing, always doing the most expensive procedure, streamlining systems to see more patients. I do not claim this included all physicians, but it’s very easy to rationalize using the newer, more costly, but not necessarily superior diagnostics or treatments.
Reimbursement dropsMarch 8, 2014
It did not take long for employers and insurers to take notice rising fees, after all, they were the payers. Insurance companies began to ask doctors and hospitals to “participate in their plan.” In return they would send patients their way and, at first, even pay the participating provider more. Once the “hook” was set, the fees began to drop, and if unhappy providers “dropped out” they would not be paid at all.
Price EscalationMarch 4, 2014
Unfortunately over the ensuing years two predictable things occurred. With more secure payment, technology soared and with it price. Secondly, people came to expect the best and wanted the newest and most expensive care and drugs even when their physician told them they were more costly and not any better—or even inferior. In addition, patients and providers wanted coverage for office visits, drugs and other things. Of course, doctors, hospitals, drug companies, etc. had no qualms about raising price. Since the patient wasn’t paying, he didn’t care.
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