ConsumerWatch: Some Covered California Patients Say They Can’t See A Doctor

Ah yes, another one of those wonderful benefits of Obamacare... of course instead of being able to keep your doctor these people can't even get a doctor, gonna work out real well if they get real sick, the free clinic can only do so much. It looks like that this is only going to get worse in California... wouldn't be surprise if this doesn't start happening in other states as well.

MOUNTAIN VIEW (KPIX 5)While open enrollment for coverage under the Affordable Care Act is closed, many of the newly insured are finding they can’t find doctors, landing them into a state described as “medical homelessness.”

Rotacare, a free clinic for the uninsured in Mountain View, is dealing with the problem firsthand.

Mirella Nguyen works at the clinic said staffers dutifully helped uninsured clients sign up for Obamacare so they would no longer need the free clinic.

But months later, the clinic’s former patients are coming back to the clinic begging for help. “They’re coming back to us now and saying I can’t find a doctor, “said Nguyen.

Thinn Ong was thrilled to qualify for a subsidy on the health care exchange.  She is paying $200 a month in premiums. But the single mother of two is asking, what for?

“Yeah, I sign it. I got it. But where’s my doctor? Who’s my doctor? I don’t know,” said a frustrated Ong.

Nguyen said the newly insured patients checked the physicians’ lists they were provided and were told they weren’t accepting new patients or they did not participate in the plan.

And Nguyen says – while the free clinic isn’t technically supposed to be treating former patents they signed up for insurance, they can’t in good faith turn them away.

Dr. Kevin Grumbach of UCSF called the phenomenon “medical homelessness,” where patients are caught adrift in a system woefully short of primary care doctors.

“Insurance coverage is a necessary but not a sufficient condition to assure that people get access to care when they need it,” Grumbach said.

Those who can’t find a doctor are supposed to lodge a complaint with state regulators, who have been denying the existence of a doctor shortage for months.

Meanwhile, the sick and insured can’t get appointments.

“What good is coverage if you can’t use it?” Nguyen said.

Experts said the magnitude of the problem is growing, and will soon be felt by all Californians. But those on the front lines, like the free clinic, are feeling it first.

More than 3 million Californians are newly insured. At the same time, a third of our primary care doctors are set to retire.

http://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/2014/04/18/consumerwatch-some-cove...

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And it's only going to get worse. I know people who cannot get insurance even tho they can afford it. They must wait until the next enrollment period. When will America wake up to the destructive policies and decisions of the liberal progressives? If this keeps up our health care system will resemble the old Soviet Union where  patients rarely saw a doctor and were treated primarily by nurses. We are so stupid. We are letting the Government apply out of control, freedom grabbing legislation and most of us sit on our as_es and do nothing.

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