But he did get treatment - just not at the first place he went. We only have the OP’s word as to why the first place turned him away. She says it was because the clinic said they didn’t accept cash - but it seems more likely that they would have said they didn’t accept cash for WC injuries. However, I’m going to go out on a limb and say that if his finger was really “half dangling off” and he really was “bleeding out of a severed atery” they wouldn’t have just sent him merrily on his way.
But none of that changes the fact that the OP wasn’t pitting worker’s comp laws that may have prevented his getting treated at the first clinic - she was pitting this incident as an example of the sad state of “the American medical system”. That’s bullshit on so many different levels.
I’m wondering why the OP thinks that the problems of dealing with the government’s bureaucratic bullshit are evidence that a larger dose of GBBS would fix healthcare in the US.
From this recent article about the “finger in the chili” incident at Wendy’s
If I was an investigator at Wendy’s, I think I’d start taking a long, hard look at any “small, basically communally owned food-related business” that was run by “an old hippy holdover” in the Wendy’s supply chain…
What I like about your discussion here is that you’re not blaming it on this country, or ‘the system.’ You’re talking about being pissed at something a little more specific, like the clinic, or a law that may be influencing the clinic.
That’s the part that has most perplexed me about the OP–how this incident demonstrates a systemic problem or suggests a national solution.
Because medicine is a bit more important than the average service provided by a business. I want my country to be one where if you’re sick or injured, you’re healed first and asked questions later, especially if you’re able and willing to pay for it. The fact that the employer in this situation screwed up doesn’t mean the employee was in any less pain.
Perhaps because other countries with that “larger dose of GBBS” don’t have those problems, as people from those countries have explained in this thread.
As far as I can tell, if the story isn’t total bullshit, the deli owner wanted to pay in cash to bypass the government insurance program of worker’s comp. And was refused.
If we had nationalized health care, I cannot believe businesses are going to be allowed an end run around the process, either.
If, as I said, the story has even truth to be relevant to anything.
I don’t know where you are in Santa Cruz but isn’t Dominican the closest hospital in Santa Cruz? I’m sure things have changed over the years…just wondering.
What makes you think it’d be considered an end run? You could go to a clinic and get your finger stitched up, and they wouldn’t need to ask where or how it happened, because everyone would have the same basic medical coverage no matter what.
Not illegal, just wrong protocol. I am going by the belief that the employee did not have a life-threatening emergency, but he told the receptionist that it was work related, and the receptionist told the employee to go obtain authorization for the treatment of his non-life threatening injury. The law is not at fault here; the law would work if the employer followed it.
Counter-example:
What if someone who received the same injury at home, but claimed the injury happened at work? The receptionist would still ask for authorization from the employer, thus thwarting the possibility of a bogus claim. If the injury was life-threatening, 911 would have been called anyways and the info received later. It would be very unlikely that something life-threatening got by without the employer noticing.
It all comes down to protocol when treating a work-related injury. The law is specific on the rights of workers, but it also states that any injuries on the job must be reported as soon as possible to a supervisor, manager, owner, etc.
For the sake of employee safety, OSHA would like to see a record of employee injury and safety records to see if a company is working as safe as possible. If you went to a single provider system, there would be a greater chance of employee injuries not being reported by the employer. I wouldn’t be surprised if some sort of bribery by the employer to the employee to report an injury as an “off hours” injury.
That is not the case where I live (Atlantic Canada). If you go to the hospital (clinics will not do stitches) you are specifically asked how it happened and if it was a workplace injury. It determines whether the workman’s comp insurance pays or the government pays. Also, if there are any lingering effects from your injury (requiring time off or a change of position or inability to return to the workplace) the only way you are going to claim your benefits is if you were honest.
I just don’t see why the employer’s lack of respect for the law means his employee, an entirely separate person, should have to wait one minute longer to get his bleeding finger fixed up. When someone is in your office with blood coming from his hand, healing it should be your top priority, not worrying about whether he should be arranging for someone else to pay you instead of doing it himself.
When the effect of the law is that a paying patient’s treatment must be delayed while bureaucratic details are sorted out, the law is definitely an issue.
All right. What would happen if you went to the hospital with a sliced finger and said it happened while you were wielding a machete as part of your job? Would you have to come back with some kind of form from your employer before they’d treat it, or would they stitch it up first and let you handle the rest later?
But that’s what I find so puzzling about this case. If machete-boy in the OP had just gone to the hospital there never would have been a problem.
Dominican Hospital in Santa Cruz is covered under the Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act of 1986. Anybody can have their emergency medical condition “treated and stabilized” there. A person can show up at the hospital’s emergency room with insurance, cash, or nothing put a pained expression and they will receive treatment. Afterward, the hospital’s billing department will naturally try to find a way to charge that person (or his or her insurance company) for the treatment, but under the law, a hospital that accepts Medicare may not deny anyone emergency treatment because he or she can’t pay (or wants to pay in cash, for that matter).
Clinics, on the other hand, are generally not covered under EMTALA. I don’t think that should be particularly surprising. You can’t expect every dermatologist’s office and eye clinic to be prepared to give out free emergency treatment to indigents. Because that’s what emergency rooms are for. Now, I admit that the excuse given by the clinic in this case sounds fishy (“they didn’t accept cash”), but the clinic could have given any number of other, quite legitimate reasons to tell machete-boy to go to a real emergency room. For example, from Cyros’ post, it sounds like a clinic in Canada would have told the erstwhile coconut-killer to hit the bricks because the clinics there won’t stitch wounds.
Perhaps the problem here is the fact that the clinic where the finger-filleter first went was labeled “urgent.” Maybe I’m just cynical, but I’ve always assumed that the use of the word “urgent” in a clinic’s name was purely a marketing gimmick. Does it really mean anything? I took a look at this list of clinics in the Santa Cruz area and it struck me that apart from the hospital emergency room, none of them were open past 9 p.m. I guess it’s lucky that machete-boy didn’t slice himself up after midnight, because then he would have had to wait a good deal more than just “one minute longer” to get treatment at the so-called “Urgent Care” clinic even if he had been carrying plastic.
The only reasons I can come up with for going to that clinic are 1) it was close by and the boss couldn’t be bothered to give a bleeding an employee a ride; or 2) the boss thought the local doc-in-a-box would be happy to take cash without asking any tough questions about his worker’s comp policy.
They would definitely treat you without identification or any special documentation (blank WC forms would be on hand, but of course, eventually they will require your provincial health care number - this would in no way delay your treatment, however).
Clinics in my corner of the world are basically used for two purposes: 1) people who have no family doctor and 2) people who cannot wait for an appointment with their regular doctor but who don’t think they need emergency services. If I am in an accident, I slip and fall, I cut myself, I’m having chest pain or I’m having any breathing difficulties, they will not see me. They will direct me to go to the nearest hospital. They simply are not equipped to deal with these types of situations. In addition, in my area, a clinic will no longer prescribe narcotic pain relief. The doctors don’t have access to patient files and potential for abuse is great.
(This somehow got posted in another thread earlier.)
Had the patient had a truly life-or-limb-threatening injury that required immediate treatment, and had the clinic been able to provide it, then it would not have mattered how he was going to pay for it or even whether he was going to pay for it. They had a responsibility to stabilize him and see that he was able to get treatment.
This is why I figure the injury was not as serious as the patient thought it was, which is true of approximately 99.9% of people who show up at the emergency room. Our ER used to have a Major Side and a Minor Side; they changed this because so many patients (with clearly minor issues) were pissed off about being on the Minor Side.