What You Should Know To Save Money On Healthcare

By Irina

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This digest-analysis of several key aspects of current healthcare crisis in U.S. may help readers become more educated consumers of healthcare services.

Why so expensive?

Roughly 15.1% of U.S. GDP (gross domestic product) is spent on healthcare that averages $5,198 per person per year. The numbers are expected to reach 17.9% of GDP and $7,352 per person in 2005. It wasn't always that way. In 1960, America's health bill was only $141 per person and nearly everyone was able to pay it out of pocket. What happened? Two key developments:

1) free market was abandoned in favor of government- or employer-sponsored prepaid plans. Individuals no longer paid bills and NO LONGER CARED what things cost.

2) technology exploded. New and better diagnostic and therapeutic techniques were developed. And everyone demanded best REGARDLESS OF COST.

Does Joe Average pay for you, or on contrary?

In a given one-year time period, 50% of insured Americans don't go to doctor. Another 30% claim less than $500. THE REMAINING 20% CONSUME 80% of $1.1 trillion annually. Only half of them indeed has serious chronic conditions or naturally induced traumatic symptoms. The remaining half is suffering LIFESTYLE DISORDERS like overeating, drinking, using drugs, practicing poor sex habits, not wearing helmets, seat belts, etc.

With health insurance you never get what you paid for. The numbers above suggest that for most of us it's LESS much more often than MORE.

Vanishing insurance

Not long ago getting a job meant getting a good health benefits -- now there are 44 million uninsured Americans. Not necessarily due to poverty, since over 25% of them make more than $50,000 a year. The trend also reflects increasing number of self-employed and small businesses without health benefits.

His plan may include too many calories for some people, mostly small-framed people. I was actually eating a very similar amount of food at one time, watching my fat intake carefully, eating plenty of fiber, and my weight wouldn’t budge. When I joined Weight Watchers, I learned that I was eating too much (for someone my size) to lose weight. After following their suggestions, I eventually lost 40 pounds and have maintained a healthy weight for almost 5 years.

Dr. Phil’s plan also actually provides too few calories for many people to be successful. Sound impossible? Let me explain.

Your body needs a certain number of calories to sustain normal functions like pumping blood, breathing, and digesting food (called your basal metabolic rate, or BMR.) This need actually depends on your current weight. The heavier you are, more calories your body needs just to function, even at rest. There are several websites to visit for a BMR calculator and more information on this subject. You also burn calories during exercise; your adjusted caloric needs including your activity level is called AMR (active metabolic rate). Some of sites you’ll find will calculate both your BMR and AMR, so keep looking if you don’t see AMR on first one you hit. As you lose weight, your BMR and AMR will drop.