HMO

HMO “In the United States of America…there are basically two groups of people who can’t be sued: foreign diplomats and HMOs” (Reid, 242). The ability for patients to sue their HMOs is not a guaranteed right. In most cases it’s not a right at all, at least not yet. Several cases have been won and Congress is trying to pass legislation to pave the way for this to change. Patients rely on HMOs to provide quality health care that covers their needs. Unfortunately this has not always been the case. HMOs can be negligent and can be guilty of malpractice; therefore, patients must be allowed to sue their HMOs for these wrongs. HMOs, or Health Maintenance Organizations, were created to help curb rising health costs and provide managed care instead of pay-as-you-go doctors. The problem with these for-profit organizations is that they provide health care for large numbers of patients, and thus must deny certain types of care in order to keep costs low. Keeping costs low and trying to provide care that reflects what the majority of people need means that specialized care is left out. Yet even if an care, hmos, health, patients, costs, sue, problem, people, legislation, hmo, bill, provide, plans, lawsuits, allow, access, states, process, managed, cost, bodart, being, because, treatment, sued, study, services, patient, one, grievance, commission, bills, about, yet, rights