Thanks to Obamacare Alive Today

[nbrandt]

October 1 at 3 Year scan Ned. Had a colonoscopy at 50' no polyps see you in 10 years .....Obamacare 2010 said no Insurance Company could issue a policy without cancer screenings for women. So after paying for my own Paps and mammos for 5 years decided to go in one year early for colonoscopy. No symptoms just passed a life insurance physical at 99 per cent But colon cancer in appendix and right colon. Had a few issues along the way (right ovary enlarged but resolved, change on breast tissue but Ok)
Thank you to the surgeon who said he got it all. Thank you to all the support and prayers from family, friends, and those I met along the way. Thank you to this site..I have learned so much.
Today I have my chemo port removed after 3 years. Still on the 6 month scan Schedule because told I am in the group most likely to recur. Today celebrating but wondering what to expect with the chemo port surgery.

[luvmymom]

October 1 at 3 Year scan Ned. Had a colonoscopy at 50' no polyps see you in 10 years .....Obamacare 2010 said no Insurance Company could issue a policy without cancer screenings for women. So after paying for my own Paps and mammos for 5 years decided to go in one year early for colonoscopy. No symptoms just passed a life insurance physical at 99 per cent But colon cancer in appendix and right colon. Had a few issues along the way (right ovary enlarged but resolved, change on breast tissue but Ok)
Thank you to the surgeon who said he got it all. Thank you to all the support and prayers from family, friends, and those I met along the way. Thank you to this site..I have learned so much.
Today I have my chemo port removed after 3 years. Still on the 6 month scan Schedule because told I am in the group most likely to recur. Today celebrating but wondering what to expect with the chemo port surgery.

Congratulations on the three years!

My mom is having her port removed today too. She is in the pre-op area right now.

Best of luck with the procedure!

[skypup]

My thanks to Obamacare: I was in the worst class of the insured, self-employed with a moderate income. No group plans available. Individual plans are limited and expensive, and could raise rates however they wished. And they did. As soon as the ACA started coming into effect, my insurance company had to issue me two rebates for having raised rates above a very reasonably 10% of cost threshold. Ha! By the time I made it to Medicare, my medical bills were 40% of a vey limited income. At the same time that I could work only half-time, I was eating through my lifetime savings -- which is now depleted. I made it, but just barely. Citizens deserve better, not just those who choose to work for large companies. I started my career with Mobil R&D Corp and was blissfully unaware of the inequities in the system, as are many now. But they are there and they are onerous on the poor and the self-employed.

[annalexandria]

Thanks to Obamacare, I will now have insurance if I happen to live past 50. I was well on my way to maxing out my 1 million dollar lifetime cap, and of course, with my pre-existing condition, it's unlikely that any new company would have insured me. Now there's no cap, and no denying people coverage because they have had cancer. Plus my kids, one of whom has a serious mental health condition that requires about a thousand dollars a month in medications, can stay on our insurance until they are 26. And my brother, who is a hard-working carpenter who had melanoma a decade ago and could never afford insurance (or even find a company that would take him), now can get health care and get the regular skin checks that he needs, but couldn't afford. My thanks to my state too, for doing as the law required and setting up an expanded Medicaid system, and not playing politics with people's lives.

[CRguy]

........ and not playing politics with people's lives.

I think you have just about nailed it here, AA !

Cheers and Harmony

[vickitwo]

After having health insurance our whole lives we found ourselves without health insurance for a very short time (long story) when my DH was DX with stage IV CC. It was only because of the ACA that we were able to get affordable insurance for him after 1 1/2 months. The medical bills that we accrued in that short time was shocking. I don't know if Obama Care will be good or bad in the long term but for now I am very thankful for it. One thing I know for certain is that the medical system in the US is broken and despirately needs to be fixed.

[justin case]

Sorry guys, but I feel that is ridiculous, that I have to cover my wife for pregnancy, after menopause Insurance costs me one third of my income, and the out of pocket is still 8,500.00 a year, per person, plus doctor visits and meds. Although Obamacare may be a blessing to some, some individuals with a moderate income, are close to losing their homes. The convenience store I go to, now has 10 employees, instead of 6, because they will only work the employees 24 hours, to avoid having to provide insurance. As I am grateful that some people are receiving benefits, I regress the nation is not going to be able, to absorb the financial debacle.
Regards,
Michael

[annalexandria]

And just as an update, my brother just got his quote on the exchange:
$400 a month for his family of three! $5000 yearly deductible for the whole family.
He's thrilled. The cheapest policy he could find before the ACA was about $1500 a month. And that was IF they would even have taken him (probably not, given the melanoma). He never could afford it, so he never bothered finishing an application. And his son can stay at the hospital here in Seattle where he was already getting his care (here in WA we have a program that covers lower-income kids).
He's very happy!

[skypup]

AA, that is great news!

[Burntcookie]

This is ridiculous. I'm glad everyone's getting the help they need, but that's not Obamacare. There was no Obamacare before October 1st. People are just starting to enroll this month. Or at least trying to. And the website's been malfunctioning. Which btw cost more taxpayer money to build than Facebook, Twitter, and Linkedin combined! And it STILL doesn't work!

And, thanks to the "Obamacare" debt and funding problems that's been building over the last several years, I haven't been able to find work for two years. And now that I *just* found a new job, I'm making less than I did in 1999 as a contract worker! My new employer told me they may never be able to hire me. Maybe 2014. Maybe. Now I'm contracting indefinitely. That means no sick pay, no holiday pay, no days off, etc. Did I mention no sick pay? Plus I'll be laid off for two weeks over the holidays. Merry Christmas.

Just remember, while people like me, and there are a LOT like me, are working in fits and starts, the Obamacare money train is not rolling in. Like Socialism, it all looks good in "theory", am I right?, but in the real world, how we are all going to pay for this is beyond me. Ok, someone just yelled "China" from the back of the room.

[MitchellVII]

Obamacare may be a good thing in some ways for the poor and those with pre-existing conditions, but as they say, there is no free lunch. Someone has to pay for all that coverage which did not exist before. That someone is mostly young healthy people who do not want nor need expensive health insurance policies. In order for Obamacare to survive, these young people MUST buy insurance at rates as high as 300% of what they could before Obamacare.

Quite simply, they won't. They will pay the small penalty instead and Obamacare will collapse.

Even now millions with insurance are getting letters in the mail from their insurers that their policies have been cancelled because they do not meet with minimum Obamacare standards and they will be replaced with policies with higher deductibles, bigger co-pays and double to triple the rate. This cannot work. Small businesses already stretched thin will be hamstrung even further and hire less.

Obamacare includes coverage for those with pre-existing conditions. This is not insurance but charity since there is pretty much a 100% guarantee the insurers will be paying out hundreds of times what they bring in. Again, someone has to pay for that. Who?

I'm glad there are some small aspects of Obamacare you have benefited from, but as a general policy it is an unworkable disaster and will result in less coverage for more money and fewer choices for millions and millions of Americans.

Healthcare needs a fix. Obamacare isn't the answer. Not even close.

[alphagam]

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[Voxx66]

I'm glad that pre-existing conditions are being dealt with but there were and are other ways to deal with that issue. This law and the way it was enacted is helping to tear apart this nation and make it ungovernable and I see no reason that reaction won't continue here if we let it.

[skypup]

Could we not have had a positive thread on something that has positively affected some of us without the neggos stomping on us? As for the one who said that the benefits received by us weren't obamacare, you are really showing your ignorance. I'm tired of rightwing ignorance masquerading as some weird form of über caring. When did your governments try to help solve the healthcare problems. And what are they doing now? Oh, yea, stopping the government. Great stuff...

[Hyfija]

Being an European (Dutch) I don't understand the discussion about Obamacare. Here we all have insurance. It is mandatory. Nobody complains about it. I pay every months whether I have a job or not around $ 130,-. The first $ 400 dollars I use for health care in a year, I have to pay myself. I never see any of the invoices. I can see them if I want to on the site of my insurance company and I look at them occasionally (Oooops, I think then. Glad I don't have to pay them myself). When you have a serious disease, it's great not to be troubled with administrative issues. So, I can't understand that a lot of people in the US are against Obamacare. I hear sometimes people say that Americans shouldn't be like Europeans (telling in the same breathe that all Europeans are socialists, which is really ridiculous). We want as much freedom as we can have. We just also want decent basic facilities in case we are unable to work and need help in difficult circumstances. When I was young I also had to pay for this insurance. There were years I never used anything of the money I paid. But that's insurance. You get it when you need it and sometimes you pay for other people knowing that other people pay for me if something happens to me. So I'm very puzzled about this discussion in the US. Don't take me wrong. I'm not telling anybody what to do. I just breaks my heart when some people on this site tell us they don't have insurance and don't know how to pay their medical cost.