I'm Off To See The Doctor. Wish Me Luck.

Your insurance company, if you're lucky enough to have one, behaves like a monopoly. That's the picture in this map from the AP, and the argument from David Leonhardt in the New York Times today. Leonhardt writes that in the debate over health care, real choice is off-limits:

Health insurers often act like monopolies — like a cable company or the Department of Motor Vehicles — because they resemble monopolies. Consumers, instead of being able to choose freely among insurers, are restricted to the plans their employer offers. So insurers are spared the rigors of true competition, and they end up with high costs and spotty service.

I recommend Leonhardt's column this morning, which I so happen to be living in a small way. Since I'm about to get a little personal here, I'll put the rest of the story after the jump.

 

Here goes:

This week I came back from vacation with the first inklings of an earache. By the time I sat down at my desk on Monday, I had a full-blown ear infection. You know how that is, right? You're probably not doing to die of it, but it's a problem.

I've got insurance, so I called my doctor. He's away for the rest of the month. The outgoing message suggested calling another doctor in the neighborhood. That physician could see me Tuesday afternoon. I called my insurance company and explained the situation. They switched my primary care physician to the new doctor and I was on my way.

When I got to the waiting room at 1 p.m., I found about a dozen people jammed into a space about the size of U-Haul's smallest panel truck. After a few minutes, one of the patients asked the receptionist when they'd be able to see the doctor. "I've been sitting here since 10:30," the patient said. Another woman looked up and said, "I've been here since quarter to 10." They were stuck in a three-hour wait, and there were several of them. I crossed my name off the bottom of the list and left — it would be prairie medicine for me, as in "Maybe this will just get better on its own."

This morning, three days in, my ears hurt so much on the inside and the out that I can't hold a telephone up to them. I'm off to the urgent care clinic in a Times Square drugstore, which is out of network and so comes with a $50 copayment instead of the usual $15. I explained to my insurance company that I'm having to go this route because my doctor's out of town. That's fine, they said. Just pay the $50.

Color me less than satisfied. As Leonhardt writes:

Americans give lower marks to their health insurer than they do to their life insurer, their auto insurer or their bank, according to the American Customer Satisfaction Index. Even the Postal Service gets better marks. (Cable companies, however, get worse ones.) No wonder President Obama's favorite villain is health insurers.