Little Bip went to a specialist’s office yesterday. Despite hours of waiting and miserable testing, he was a champ. The results of the test were a relief. An issue with potential long-lasting impact is clearing up and he should be fine in the end.

The doctor, a middle aged man, told us to return in two weeks for a follow-up appointment. We asked about going to an office closer to home. He replied that the doctor who staffed that office was on maternity leave, so we’d have to make the longer trek. Then, for no apparent reason, he relayed that he had an earlier partner who had labor induced on a Friday, then was back at work on Monday.

Summing it up, he flatly said, “But they just don’t make them like they used to.”

I looked at Lisa with wide eyes. As we were stepping up to the desk to schedule the appointment I whispered, “I wasn’t going to mention that I’m on paternity leave for a month.”

Most of the serious jousting in municipal elections happens after all the kiddies have returned to school, but the Delco County Council race has been unusually hot this Summer. In case you’ve missed anything, here a a bunch of links to help you catch up.

Above Average Jane posted an interview with David Landau. Jane’s long-format interviews with notable PA candidates are among the best original, informational contributions from any area blogger. Her interview with David was her first (and hopefully not her last) for the 2007 elections.

David’s Democratic running mate, Ann O’Keefe launched her new campaign site.

Congressman Joe Sestak (PA-07) held a roundtable along with all three Democratic County Council candidates to support their push for a new county health department. Both the Delco Times and the Evening Bulletin covered.

Up in Montgomery County, the Republican candidates for County Council are trying to distance themselves from the national Republican party by calling for the dismissal of Alberto Gonzales. (Hilariously, though, their press release called him “Roberto.”) In the meantime, their Delco counterparts are trying to say that the 2007 election is a local election; they claim the disarray of Republicans nationally will not be a factor in local races. (Keep telling yourselves that, Andrew Reilly!)

David Landau’s making the case that County Council is pandering to the wealthier Western sections of Delco, at the expense of the inner ring communities like Lansdowne and Yeadon. Landau held a press conference with Lansdowne Mayor Jayne Young, who agrees with him.

The Delco GOP is claiming that they’re the environmental party. (No, seriously!)

Landau met with local union members at Steelworkers local 10-1 in Linwood. Take special note later in the article at how the Republicans laughably try to label Landau as an ACLU lawyer. They’ve used the tag repeatedly in recent public statements. It’s true that David worked for the ACLU decades ago. The problem for them is that the ACLU has strong credibility among David’s core Democratic supporters, who are sick of encroachments on civil liberties by the Bush administration. The association will simply not damage him at all among independents and any non-dittohead Republicans, either. Those machine guys have been drinking the one-party water for too long, that they’re still stuck on 1988 talking points. (And by the way, isn’t that nationalizing the debate?)

David Landau’s campaign office held it’s grand opening. Joe Sestak and State Rep. Greg Vitali (PA-166), were in attendence at the celebration in Clifton Heights.

Here concludes our roundup. And that’s just covering the news in the last 10 days, here in the dog days of August.

Employers in the Delaware Valley region received a brief word from Independence Blue Cross that they’d reached an agreement with the Crozer-Keystone system.

To our members who receive care through the Crozer-Keystone Health System

We are pleased to have agreed on terms for a new four-year contract with Crozer-Keystone Health System.

Our members may continue to receive care through Crozer-Keystone from the physicians they have come to know and trust. In addition, our members who have health plans that require a primary care physician will not need to change doctors. We would like to thank our customers, members, and the physicians serving patients at Crozer-Keystone for their patience and understanding during contract discussions.

We are committed to continuing to offer our members access to affordable, quality care through a broad network of hospitals, physicians and other health care services.

Christopher Butler
Chief Operating Officer
Independence Blue Cross

That a deal would be struck was a certainty. For each company, the possibility of losing the other’s customer base, even for a short while, was a form of mutually assured destruction.

No details of the deal have been made public. Consequently, the other shoe has yet to drop for the region’s employers and workers. If there’s a surprising rate hike at the next renewal period, we may well have an idea how these negotiations played out.

The two Southeastern PA behemoths of health care are locked in battle. Independence Blue Cross (IBX) and the Crozer-Keystone system (whose facilities the hospitals in Upland, Chester, Ridley Park, Springfield, and Drexel Hill) have been unable to reach a new contract agreement. The current contract expires on August 19th, so the bickering is spilling into the press. The disagreement centers, of course, on the reimbursement schedule for care provided to patients.

According to reporting from Patti Mengers of the Delco Times, 90,000 IBX customers were notified of the pending contract expiration. At this time, patients are already seeing some of the negative impacts of the looming deadline. Keystone HMO and Personal Choice customers cannot get approvals for elective care or procedures scheduled to take place after the deadline.

After months of negotiation, IBX has made its kinda-sorta-mostly final offer, and declared it fair. Per the Delco Times, Crozer-Keystone doesn’t agree.

Crozer-Keystone Health System Chief Executive Officer Joan K. Richards does not agree.

“Both parties have invested a lot of time and effort into the negotiations but, as of today, we have been unable to reach an agreement that covers the cost of caring for our patients,” Richards noted Monday in a prepared statement.

Both sides would be financially devestated to have the contract negotiations fail. (Mutually assured destruction?) The hospitals would find a third of its patients without network health coverage. And Independence Blue Cross would surely feel the wrath of employers and subscribers.

If there’s one event that can surely bring me joy, its one quasi-monopoly arguing with another quasi-monopoly about how to divvy up my insanely high insurance premiums. I’m sure that their resolution to the current impasse will be to pass along the costs to families whose health and welfare hangs in the balance.

Single payer starts to sound more and more attractive each year that my premiums rise at rates double or triple the rate of inflation.