One patient went overseas for an operation to avoid paying high out-of-pocket costs here.

A single mother in a low-paying job worried that private health insurance will leave her financially strapped.

And a doctor described how the 18 health care providers where he practices need almost as many employees just to keep track of insurance paperwork.

Those stories highlighted a hearing this week on creating single-payer health care in the state that advocates contend would solve those problems.

The current system is not working, and we should not take a failure and make it a bigger failure, said Dr. Jason M. Matuszak, a family physician who specializes in sports medicine at Excelsior Orthopaedics in Amherst.

Matuszak was one of about two dozen people who voiced support for New York Health, a bill sponsored by Assemblyman Richard N. Gottfried, D-Manhattan, during a hearing in Hohn Auditorium at Roswell Park Cancer Institute. Hes conducting six hearings statewide, with plans to move the bill out of the Assemblys Health Committee, of which he is chairman, and introduce it into the Assembly for a vote in the spring.

Even people with coverage are finding obstacles to care and costs devastating to their finances, Gottfried said.

The bill, to no ones surprise, is receiving intense criticism.

The Business Council of New York State, which lobbies for private employers, has long been on record of opposing the proposal, calling its promise of universal, unlimited coverage a mirage.

Gottfried is no stranger to trying get approved single-payer health care. The plan was originally introduced 23 years ago and passed the Assembly. It has not been brought to the Legislature for a vote since then.

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Single payer for health care gets a hearing in Buffalo