Forgetting the tax benefits as it only applies to some.
Whether you went to hospital or to see a specialist, whether it was an emergency or elective surgery, tell your (or your close friend's) experience and include:
What if comprehensive car insurances were like private health insurances?
Suppose you had a car accident and the car needs repairs. Your insurer will say, "Each part has a set fee. If the mechanic charges above the set fee, you'll be out of pocket."
So you get your bumper, the bonnet, lights and the radiator repaired. Your insurance will pay only a part of it and you'll pay anything above the set fee! On top of that, the mechanic will tell you that "The panel beater will bill you directly. His charges will depend on whether he works a day shift or after hours (compare with anaesthetists' bills)"
You pay your standard excess ($500), then gap for each part, say $500 (=doctors fee above MBS for each procedure) and later you'll get a bill from the panel beater for another $300 (=anaesthetist's fee above MBS). If this is rubbish, then that is what our private health insurance system is.
Private health insurance is not an insurance scheme from the patients' point of view. If it was a genuine insurance scheme, like a comprehensive car insurance, we should be able to pay the excess and the rest has to be looked after by the insurer.
With a comprehensive car insurance, you have the peace of mind that, whatever happens to your car, you only pay the excess and the insurer accepts the risks of expenses to get the car fixed. In contrast, with PHI, it is the insurer that has the peace of mind of paying the government stipulated set fees and you have the risk of paying gaps!
What are you talking about this is a part of PHI. You choose the level of cover you want, from basic to comprehensive. Then you choose the excess you want. There will always be things not covered, just as there are things not covered in comprehensive car insurance.
My complain is not about the things that are not covered. My complain is about GAPS in things that are covered.
Eg.
A covered procedure has a MBS set fee. Say $1000.
If the procedure is done under the public system, Medicare system pays $1000 towards procedure. No Gaps.
If the same procedure is done as a private patient, Medicare system only pays 75% ie $750 towards procedure. Then the PHI pays 25% ie $250, however, the doctor charges above the MBS set fee, say $1400. So the patient has a gap of $400 which the PHI does not pay no matter what your excess level or cover level is. To summarise, PHI only pays 25% (Exception: more with a gap cover if the dr chooses to participate) of the MBS set fee, which is the same fee Medicare covers anyway under the public system.
You can see this breakdown from payment statements you receive from PHI.
Not to mention you need to ring around / do research yourself to find out these gaps if you want to find out prior (at least in my case).
What is this gap cover that the doctors can choose to participate?
GAP cover is an arrangement with doctors and PHI where doctors agree to accept less fees( sometimes the MBS fee). Doctors do this case by case and I could not get any doctor to use the GAP cover for medical procedures done on me or my children. The doctors I've contacted told me that they may use the GAP cover if the patients are healthcare/concession card holders.
Except if cost of repairs are too much, you are paid out the sum insured .. how would that work with PHI?
Some ops cost 25K, some cost 12K. It depends if you are the type of person who likes to sleep at night because you can get the best care if you become a person who gets sick, esp as altomic says, chronically unwell. Or, you may be a person who one minute is taking life and health for granted and the next minute you can't remember what just happened to get you in such dire circumstance: car/bike/skiing/crossing the road, serious sickness diagnosis.
A new knee costs 25K without and 3K with insurance. A prostatectomy is around 12K. Brain tumour = sky's the limit.
I have car ins and house and contents ins and health ins. I can afford it. I'm not sure what I'd advise if a friend of mine were really struggling to pay any of these. I guess they'd not have a car worth any more than 3rd party and not own a house. But, everyone else may want to sleep at night and have ins.
In recent bus fires it was amazing to me how few people had ins, or were woefully under insured.
my wife just had specific medical treatment 2 weeks ago. 2 hours of treatment = $12,000.
HI doesn't cover this, however we live in one of the luckiest countries- with a decent public health system. Medicare will reimburse us most of the cost.
anyone got any medicare coupon codes?
If a person qualifies for a Health Care Card then their medicare threshold is approx $1,300.
Gough Whitlam, I thank you.
I think it is good to remember this, we do live in a lucky country with better health care than any time in its history.
If it's anything like QLD insurance companies charge you ~$20,000 a year if you're in a "danger" area, i.e. you need the insurance. Everyone else pays exactly what they did before but your premiums go up.
I is the unknown out of pocket expenses that are the biggest worry, you are in hospital as you had and accident or are unwell, mostly to unwell to make reasonable decisions and that is when the hospital expects you to decide HI or not…. they will not tell you the options and they can never quote the doctor costs, and even when the doctor comes to see you he / she will not tell you what you will pay above you HI cover…. makes if very hard to know what is the right decision. HI should cover everything
Maybe the best way to look at it is that PHI is a sort of "catastrophe" insurance- if you can get a good deal on a policy with a large excess it would be OK for most people. Because even the "top" covers have huge gaps in them (out of pocket fees etc). As I mentioned before, if you have a real emergency, the public system is OK; you really only need PHI just for certain procedures that are too expensive to self fund.
Health insurance and all insurances is mostly for peace of mind.
Its a GOOD thing for you and for the insurance company that you don't use it… (else you have a health issue).
The public system is OK however it just depends if you want to wait or not, and while you are waiting your condition may get worse and worse.
It is also good for your pockets… if you are earning over the threshold and getting taxed via MLS.
I have a stingy friend who always tells me "Waste of Money, Insurances are not investments they are worthless and doesn't appreciate" and i'm like "Insurances aren't MOMENTARY investments but they are a investment in your future life for the potential future catastrophe".
Another personal experience—Iast year I fell off my bicycle and suffered a fractured wrist and elbow; with visits to (private) casualty, MRI/CT scans etc, specialist orthopaedic visits (luckily no operation needed), hand therapists, splints etc, I was out of pocket about $1500…not 1 cent of this recoverable from PHI because I was not admitted to hospital….BUT because I am a member of Bicycle Victoria, they covered 85% of the costs (minus $150 excess). If I would have been hit by a car, TAC would have paid (but I might have been dead!)
I only have top tier extra cover for myself and missus, approx. $60/pp and I get $2000+ benefits every year so totally worth.
Tho it's gonna be different story with hospital cover.
Sounds good. I have hospital and basics but I think I'm going to remove hospital as I use physio and remedial massages regularly. Will come to $20 a month.
You will then be liable for the Medicare Levy Surcharge (assuming it would affect you). Although depending on how much Hospital Cover costs, you would need to be earning quite a lot for this to happen.
http://www.ato.gov.au/Individuals/Medicare-levy/Medicare-lev…
All my hospital fees are covered w' an excess that kicks in just once per annum o matter if I go to hosp once or 10 times. The quote for an operation is given before the op so that you know what you are in for and you have to sign that to show you agree.
So, is there any Private Health Insurance that covers EVERYTHING, every single thing, 100% with ZERO excess or out of pocket fees? I do not care how expensive the cover will be, but is there any company that offers such a package at all?
Some travel insurance policies have unlimited coverage, so if you are a tourist or such in this country, then yes you could get 100% cover…
Funny how Health Insurance here can't cover every cent but if you need treatment overseas and have travel insurance, everything is covered (some with no excess).
So, is there any Private Health Insurance that covers EVERYTHING, every single thing, 100% with ZERO excess
NO: for permanent residents and citizens.
YES: for overseas workers in Australia (IMAN health). It is expensive like $6,000 per year for a family, but IIRC covers outpatient services, pharmaceuticals, specialist fees etc in addition to in hospital services.
Eg.
leiev, re no excess at all whatsoever … The trouble with that is that the medical provider could charge whatever thye liked and the fund would be so exposed financially that it would be out of business quick smart.
If a fund said we will cover whatever it costs, the doctors/providers would have no brakes under that sort of system.
Well, they are already charging whatever they liked, and the patients (or medicare) are the ones that bear it now.
yeah don't you love it … the foundations of business … charging for a good or service!
This is a good discussion we have got going here guys.
Just like the OP, I'd be interested to hear more about waiting times for non PHI patients at public hospitals, and the type of surgeries they've had.
I know for a fact that the waiting lists for orthopaedic and neurosurgery at large Melbourne public hospitals are often unreasonably long, Eg I know of people in a lot of pain who have waited 6-9 months for their surgery. With spinal surgery for example, if you don't have cancer or loss of bowel/bladder control, then you are usually not considered urgent pretty much no matter how much pain you are in. In other words, without PHI you are stuffed as those types of operations are hideously expensive, IF you can find a surgeon who will touch you if uninsured.
AFAIK, no surgeon will touch you in private health if you're uninsured, even if you offer to pay for the cost of the operation and then some.
Their reason being, complications might arise and then what if you can't pay to fix those? Or just don't want to pay for the extras they suggest, or find some other reason to wind up suing them.
My sister is a nurse. She works in private and public hospitals.
In terms of nursing, she thinks the level of care is perhaps a bit less in most private hospitals. They are after all out to make a profit. Also, the union holds much less sway in private hospitals and therefore they take advantage of this by upping the patient ratios.
In most regional areas she wouldn't bother with private insurance. Private hospitals in regions are often little more than glorified day surgeries and if the shit hits the fan you are going to be in public anyway.
Private health is more concerned with creating tangible points of difference wrt public hospitals than actually delivering better medical care. Ergo you get your own room, which makes the patient feel better than those plebs in a ward. Also, when they deliver food, they are under instructions to remove the cellophane wrapper from the muffins so that the patients will think that they are baked rather than prefabricated.
She thinks that public hospitals are probably better at dealing with trauma, basically because they see so much of it. They get much more practice.
Public hospitals are definitely capable of handing out terrible treatment. You definitely see more inexperienced registrars at public hospitals. However for most people and treatments there isn't much difference.
Nursing at private hospitals is definitely easier because you have less bogan scrounger non compliant patients and also you don't have to deal with the rivers of blood every Friday and Saturday night. However she prefers to actually work in that environment because it keeps her on her toes.
Interesting discussion…I've always just accepted that you should have private health (my parents nagged me to get it when I was early 20s and I have just kept paying). Almost ten years later I pay about $40/month now. I've needed two ambulances (due to reckless behaviour which I've grown out of) which in total came to about $1500, plus a gap here and there on dental, physio, etc. In total I'm probably $2k out of pocket. Will see if it's worth just setting aside the $40/month myself. I'm pretty healthy and have never had any serious problems nor do any run in my family.
"never had"…
Its insurance. You're not suppose to come up on top year in year out.
There is always going to be people on both sides of the fence.
However, my family has been in the medical realm for my entire life (and before that) and it has always been said that you go public if you're about to die but private for everything else.
To each his own, but often it is the same specialists working in public and private anyway so in that respect the standard of care should be similar. I think the surgical waiting lists are an indictment on the public system however. Dunno who to blame for that…. State governments?
Private health insurance, like all businesses, are there to make a profit. Medicare on the other hand is not, in fact it makes a huge loss. Think about the few thounsands of dollars you contribute each year in private health premiums, or whatever you pay in Medicare. Add it all up and you will see that it is impossible to cover a hospital admission each year for the amount the average taxpayer pays.
On the other hand, there are those who are unable to contribute due to unemployement or illness. Those who get excellent value for money out of their insurances (Medicare and PI included).
So the only way for these schemes to remain profitable or break even is that for every one sick person who gets "value for money", several healthy people subsidise their healthcare.
Personally I see it as a blessing that I'm subsidising the healthcare of others. Ask a sick person who gets "value for money" for their contributions and they will trade you their money for your health any day.
It depends on your circumstances including:
- Income
- Expenses
- Assets
- Liabilities
- Dependants or upcoming dependants
- Attitude to risk
- Attitude to medical treatment e.g. do you want your own doctor or are you happy with some random person / are you happy to wait or do you want to get it done
My wife and I earn enough that we would pay well over half the cost of our health insurance in Medicare surcharge for no benefit if we didn't have it so it is a bit of a no brainer for us now to have it. Our daughter had her head split open at school and was taken away in an ambulance. No cost to us because of health insurance but I think it would have been hundreds or thousands otherwise.
My father in law had to have a pace maker fitted. Would have cost him $65k without health insurance but cost him nothing.
Just confirmed with my brother about his colonoscopy he had done last year. He had no insurance. He saw the GP who bulk billed. The GP sent the referral to the public hospital. Within a month he had it done all covered under Medicare. He never paid a cent.
My father had the procedure done recently also. He had top level insurance. Saw a GP who bulk billed. Sent the referral off to the private hospital. Within a month had the procedure done. Didn't pay anything as far as I am aware. No excess on day procedures.
Great comments everyone, keep them coming!
Man with cancer waits 15 months for colonoscopy
The case of a Hobart man who had to wait 15 months for a colonoscopy only to discover he had bowel cancer has highlighted the critical state of hospital waiting lists in Tasmania.
Mark Pearce was a category one patient who was supposed to be seen within 30 days. Instead he waited in pain for more than a year.
As I said before, we all hear the horror stories but this thread is about your experiences or someone you know personally.
Cheers for the link though.
That is a terrible tragedy. But in Melbourne you can pay out of pocket (if no PHI) and get a colonoscopy done privately within a week for around $300 -500 in most cases. So really in that situation you could argue that the PHI is non essential. (I realise that many people Eg pensioners, single mums etc may not be able to afford $300-500.). But if you are in constant pain from shoulder or hip or knee arthritis, not many people can pay $10-15K to avoid the 6-12 month surgical waiting lists at say RMH or St Vincent's Hospital… And that can be after waiting months to see the specialist in the orthopaedic outpatient clinic.
At a small private hospital in inner Melbourne (I have first hand knowledge of this) the bed charge is covered 100% by some PHI providers, but there is a $50/ night out of pocket fee for policy holders of some other PHI providers (even with "top" cover), this leaves those patients out of pocket through no fault of their own. Not sure if it is the hospital or the PHI provider to blame.
For the public system, your GP's letter gets put in a pile and prioritised by one of the surgeons or gastroenterologists. If you are categorised incorrectly for whatever reason, then you can end up with your procedure late, or if the hospital is running late with a particular category. For cancer, it's generally category 1 because pending the outcome of the procedure, the patient may need surgery or other treatment. Unfortunately at the public hospital it has to be done this way because there are generally not enough slots (combination of factors - facility, theatre time, staff, etc) to do everyone within a month. If there are too many category 1 patients, then the category 2 and 3s get put back.
For a private hospital, your GP's letter goes to a specific surgeon/gastroenterologist of your (or your GP's) choice. That surgeon puts you on his/her next available slot. That's it. Your referral doesn't get floated around the system and your slot doesn't get shifted up and down.
As for the costs: You seem to have GPs who have chosen to bulk bill you, saving you a small gap there. But the private hospital can still charge you an excess for using their day facilities. The surgeon/gastroenterologist may bill you a gap for the procedure, and the anaesthetist may also do the same. Then if a tissue sample is taken and sent to the pathologist for exaimination, they too may bill you. Sounds like you were quite fortunate not to incur a gap on all fronts, but it's not always the case. Whereas it will always be gap-free at the public hospital.
yup u can get free for public, for me i still prefer private hospital vs public hospital.
1. because i want to reduce the gov budget for health - no need to increase additional medical levy to me :)
2. private hospital has enough resources and the waiting time is shorter (it is depend where do u lived i think. in my area seems public hospital always has not enough resources)
3. the doctor more happy doing this thing at private hospital, not sure why, when i did my colonoscopy last year, the doctor give me suggestion to do it at private hospital. he said if u got phi, better do it at private :)
If you have good habit with your oral hygiene, you should go to your dentist twice a year .
Just to clean my teeth, normally cost me around $150, twice is $300
If I am talking about my family, then just multiply with number of your family member. so it is worth it for me and my family.
I haven't included my massage, glasses etc
My family "breaks even" on extras cover; 3 of us wear glasses and use physiotherapy services regularly, plus 6 monthly dental visits. To be honest I can't complain about the extras component of PHI.
Grandma pays $7500 a year.
Did $58000 in surgeries last year.
is it your grandma took the visitor cover?
I'm paying ~$2500 per year for top extras/crap hospital cover still comes up almost $2k cheaper than not getting it and copped MLS. Getting $750 back for optical, $600ish for alternative therapy crap and another $1k from dental so I'm almost break even.
Might jack up the hospital cover when I get older or when I can be stuffed to get my (elective) surgery done.
Protip: if you want to see a specialist, find a friendly GP whose kind enough to write a referral letter then most likely you will be able to bulk billed the lot. That's why a lot of specialists will ask have you got a referral from your GP…ended up seeing the same specialist but for nix.
ALL specialists will ask for a referral from a GP because otherwise there will be no medicare benefit payable!
Ended up in the ER the other night for drinking too much. Quite thankful that I had medibank as the trip would have cost me $450 if I didn't. All they did was take my blood pressure and tell me to vomit if I needed to.
It's a bloody expensive trip….my 6km ride ended up costing me $800 but thank goodness it's covered by my provider.
Protip #2: if you're on some kind of welfare and eligible for the Health Care Card, your ambo trips are free as well.
I have PHI and intend to keep it as I'm an old fart. In a nutshell you will only ever get rebates for a doctor if you are in hospital. Any other visits are covered by Medicare and you have out of pocket expenses. I had been in a Public Hospital for 5 weeks last year and was asked if I wanted to use PHI. For that I get a TV and a paper each day but….if I elected to go as a public patient I would have to be funded by the hospital's budget. This way my local hospital gets an extra $20k or so from my stay and I'm not out of pocket for anything. I still get the best treating doctors and am asked politely if a med student wants to examine me (always agree as my last kid is a med student :)in the final year) However for minor elective stuff eg o/night stay I know I can treated pretty damn quick .
In the future, we may not have a choice about whether we can have Medicare or not. I think they're trying to means test Medicare as part of a savings measure or reform to the health system per article here.
http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/bulkbilling-limited-to-lowi…
Just looking at the services that Medicare currently provides here
http://www.privatehealth.gov.au/healthinsurance/whatiscovere…
reveals that there are a lot of services. If Medicare (as a whole) suddenly became unavailable purely because of means testing, then PHI would become a very mandatory choice.
To sum up, PHI is important, to help the gov budget + to keep the phi exist + your health keep in the good maintenance.
Don't just spend money on your car, but you also need to spend some of your money to keep your health in good order:)
Forgot to mentioned I have called ambulance twice, one for my son and one for my self, it is bloody expensive transport in Australia, more expensive than my domestic trip with airplane in Australa :)
As a junior doctor and currently learning my trade in the public health system i think worth mentioning are the health benefits of PHI 1) You wont be left on a couple of year waiting list for elective surgeries (even though u may have to pay a portion of the fee with PHI) 2) Which no one has mentioned most of the time in the public system a REGISTRAR ( a training specialist) will do the operation sometimes with a consultant in the room other times not. Now this poses as a problem for me if i were to be having spinal surgery for instance as the margin for error here is much lower than say a more simple gall bladder removal or cholecystectomy.
I think it is important not to generalise here. 1) You may be on a waiting list without PHI but that doesn't mean that you will be seen straight away with PHI. 2) My wife is an emergency nurse in a public hospital and she says the registrars are seen to be more highly competent than most specialists that come in as they are exposed to so many different situations daily.
As I said, there are horror stories in private and public. Let's keep to personal experiences and not what could happen.
I've worked in the health industry for over 20 years and seen good and bad in both public and private systems. Yes, I have seen useless specialists and some super smart registrars…that's life, you can never achieve uniform perfection unfortunately.
We have the ANZ one, never used it, but it looks OK comes free with plat. cards. Not sure how it compares to purchased travel insurance?.
http://www.anz.com.au/personal/credit-cards/platinum/benefit…
umm.. this is Travel Insurance and not Private Health Insurance. You are only covered when you are overseas.
lol
Possibility of Find a job and live overseas to get benefit of Platinum card!?
oops wrong forum, my bad.
Wrong forum but who cares! You sent me a dream about a wonderful world where banks gave us free private health cover.
Has anyone done a ROI ?
e.g. How much would you pay for PHI in 5 years compared to how much out of pocket you are if you didn't have PHI.
Mate, this is an investment, and can you put price on your health? I still remember when I got toothache, imagine if don't have money, u want to see dentist, but don't have money to pay them especially if you need to do root canal treatment. what are you going to do ? go to public hospital? they will ask you wait.
think about toothache!!!! sometimes this thing are priceless, you can't measure with money.
I am paying around $2500/year for whole family, 80% i got my money back from the extra that I claim, so 20% will be on my PHI pocket, let said 40 years I joined with them (let said the margin for my PHI is $1k/ year, so for 40 years, they might get $40k from me) and one day I need to do big surgery, what ever you want to call, in average now you might have to spend at least $50k, 10 or 20 or 30 years later this will be double or triple the cost, u want wait on public hospital? think about the queue.
you guys might spend $800-$1500 on car insurance, do you get some of them every year? nothing? what for? for peace of your mind in case if something happen to you.
I wonder whether it is beneficial to outsource certain healthcare services. For example, have the suitable procedures done in approved facilities in foreign countries like Thailand. It will cost less for Medicare/PHI to fund that. Patients will have less waiting times.
good idea, how about to India or Malaysia, they also popular for these things, but after travel to those countries, I still prefer to be done in Australia. no offend to people from those countries. I have been in the hospital for those countries in the past
Maybe not such a good idea heading overseas for surgery-there is a risk of superbug infection- see http://www.theage.com.au/travel/travel-news/overseas-travel-…
I went overseas many years ago to get my eyes zapped.
Cost me $300 per eye plus had a great holiday. Got a quote for $4200 here in Melbourne for the same procedure.
Thanks everyone for the input. I read every post. Due to my circumstances, I decided to cancel my hospital cover today but kept extras. Going to use the saved money towards a mixture of remedial massages, cree mini flash lights, increased charity donation to PMH and regular trips to Boracay with my wife.
Cheers
Hi Oldbugger, thanks for updating us on your decision. Enjoy the extras and the holidays! :)
I'm looking at extra's only cover, and it's hard. The limits and waiting periods mean that it's very hard to break-even if all you need is optical and dental. Everything else is pretty 'meh'.
I suggest you call Medibank and tell them you want extras and no waiting period. This is what I did and after a bit of a chat they let me have it.
Had it cancelled when I went overseas and upon return they gave me the hospital and extras for half price for two months, claim straight away. They still have this deal. Then you cancel and keep extras, like I just did. $20/month.
I asked too, they gave me up to the 6mth waits waived. I need major dental which is 12mth. :(
Spoke to Medibank and they said they may be able to waive the waiting periods and claim now on sign up this month.
I got a 30 min remedial massage today. Cost was $54 but all I paid was $12 after they swiped my Medibank card. Not bad for $20 a month.
out of context, any one can explain to me each of the massage things?
Natural therapies
Buteyko, Herbal medicine consultations, Homeopathy, Naturopathy, Nutrition
Oriental therapies
Acupressure, Acupuncture, Chinese herbal medicine consultation, Chinese massage, Kinesiology, Reflexology, Shiatsu, Traditional chinese medicine consultation
Massage therapies
Alexander technique, Aromatherapy, Bowen therapy, Deep tissue massage, Feldenkrais, Lymphatic drainage, Myotherapy, Remedial massage, Rolfing, Sports massage, Swedish massage, Therapeutic massage
Can anyone recommend the cheapest private health cover that is still eligible for medicare levy surcharge exemption?
I did some searches using the privatehealth.gov.au and gave "Health Insurance Fund of Australia Limited" as the cheapest one with $66/month premium. I have never heard that company before.
if u got family that worked or ex cba, you might join cbhs, the cheapest and good value for money
So, is the general consensus on extras that you will break-even or lose out? I've never claimed more than I pay in premiums, and the government foots ~30% which is pure profit for the health insurance provider.
A mate had a sudden heart problem (viral weakened his heart) and he was insured but did his research
PUBLIC, on a waiting list while he was medicated and the gov select the doctor, treatment, timing and they type of operation
PRIVATE, he selected his doctor and researched treatment and got a referal to his surgen of choice for keyhole surgery (puclic was open heart) and he could work around the doctor and his time commitments.
He went private, cost was >120K and his recoverey was 1/4 of open heart… Out of pockets after insurance picked up the tab was excess $500 (paid once despite it going into the new year as it was the one diagnosis) and $3k (surgen, anathatist and in hopsital pay tv, extra food and drink)
Physio and heart recovery treatments were all met too for 12 months afterwards too… Private was a great deal for him, way better than PUBLIC but it cost money for the insurance as well as the out of pockets but he was soon back at work and he made more money as being sick was costing him money.
But things can go the other way, some are out of pocket way more (often they have the wrong level of coverage, mistakenly went to private emergency first and not public or want treatment thats not covered like cosmedic) some are out many, many $$$$ and they often could have gone public!
If you go public they often offer to pay the GAP so they can claim your private; this will have to become compolsory one day!!!
I am currently getting free basic private health via a corp rate.
If you are a IT contractor and would like to get involved on free medibank services let me know.
Cheers
Nav
oops.
it's not an patient thing. I simply don't wish to discuss a personnal situation in detail on a public forum.