4064 Medical insurance, care

Sunday, July 5, 2015

It takes 42 muscles to frown, and only 4 to reach out and smack you.

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Want to know if your medical insurance is good?  Don't bother reading online reviews.  Spend a few days in the hospital, especially over the weekend.

When I was hospitalized with pneumonia after Hurricane Sandy, I had doctors coming out of the woodwork, at the rate of about 5 a day.  Lung doctors.  Kidney doctors. Heart doctors.  Infectious medicine specialists. Whatever.  I didn't know who most of them were, or why they were there.  Some didn't do a damn thing, just asked me how I was feeling, and left.  Sometimes my "vitals" were taken by four different doctors (not nurses - although they did it too) every day.  Of course every single one of them submitted a bill.  Also, all kinds of tests and scans were being scheduled - most of which I refused because I saw no reason for them.

The woman in the other bed lived in a badly-maintained low income senior project, and I think she had just medicaid.  The doctor who had admitted her never even stopped by, even though she kept asking for him.  She was given no tests and no medicine.  Every time a nurse came in she told the nurse she still had a lot of pain in her leg, and the nurse said she'd tell the doctor, but the woman was released (pretty much kicked out) before I was, and STILL had not been seen by a doctor.  Not one.  She didn't even have a diagnosis, and she still had the pain.  She cried as she was leaving.

I suspect my insurance and credit rating were much better than hers.

Disgusting.

What brought this up was an online comment I just read.  People in other countries do not understand why anyone would be against the ACA.  A Canadian wrote that he noticed a big difference between medical care in the US, and in Canada (where it's all free).  In Canada the first thing a doctor will ask you is what is the problem, where does it hurt.  In the US, the first thing you are asked is whether you can afford the doctor's services, what insurance you have, and you might hear "Oh, oops, I don't accept that insurance, goodbye."

Disgusting.

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Back when Jay was in the hospital so much, I kept pretty tight control of doctors wandering in.  I'd ask them who, why, what they plan to do for him, and most of them kind of sputtered and said they'd been looking at Jay's records and thought it was an interesting case, so thought they'd stop by and say hello.  And then they'd leave, and they didn't submit bills.  After the first day, I guess the word got around that Jay wasn't a free lunch, and we didn't get drop-ins other than his own known doctors.

I kick myself for not managing my own hospital stay as well, but it's different when you're the one in the bed, I guess.  I need to get over being so compliant.
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3625 Appalled

Sunday, September 30, 2012

The limits of tyrants are prescribed by the endurance of those whom they suppress.

-- Frederick Douglas --

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Nescience is not understanding something you have no way of understanding; ignorance is not understanding something you should understand;  stupidity is not having the ability or desire to understand.

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A few posts back I begged folks to read John Scalzi's list of what it means to be poor (http://whatever.scalzi.com/2005/09/03/being-poor/).  The following is a comment on John's essay, about one major difference between being poor in the US and being poor in Britain:

harasseddad says:

September 4, 2005 at 2:20 pm

I had no idea. Here in the UK we tend to think all Americans are rich – but
Living in Britain means hospital treatment is free, for everyone.
Living in Britain means ambulances are free, for everyone.
Living in Britain means dental treatment is free, for everyone.
Living in Britain means prescription drugs are free to those on welfare and a maximum of £6.50 for everyone else (that’s under $5)
Living in Britain means a free pint of milk every day for every child in britain until they’re two (till five if their parent(s) are on welfare)
Living in Britain means you might be poor, you might have to go to bed hungry, you might not have a bed – but you will always be able to see a dentist, a doctor, a psychiatrist. And they’ll be the same hospital, the same standard of treatment as everyone else.
I have never been so grateful for the national health service – and more appalled that the richest country on Earth can not achieve such simple goals for its citizens.

Yeah. I am appalled, too.  I don't understand why there's so much opposition.  "Obamacare" is a half-assed attempt to get as close as possible to what is really needed, but it's unweildy because the opposition makes it impossible to go all the way and do it right.

The saddest thing is that I don't think the sheeple even know what they're opposing.

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Note for future reference - 9/27 - woke at country house with swollen right index finger.   Firm lump in the middle joint. Jammed?  Spider bite?  As of 10/6, still swollen.  Lump size of large pea.  Finger bends as far as swelling will allow.
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3621 US- amputate, Canada- save, is that our choice?

Sunday, September 23, 2012

Success can be redefined.

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People who are against "Obamacare" point to the Canadian healthcare system as something awful, something to avoid at all costs.  And somehow they seem to be able to find some Canadians who don't like it.  But it seems to me that there are a lot more Canadians who like it.  Like this one:

http://highlyirritable.wordpress.com/2009/08/19/at-least-she-can-still-give-me-the-finger/

Oddly enough, those Canadians who don't like it are alive and kicking.  And it seems to me that there are a lot more Americans who are dying from depredations of insurance companies, or are financially devastated by the American health care system.

Really, is it only rich Americans, Congressmen, and rich foreigners who deserve American medical care?

I don't understand.
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3557 Get off my lawn! #1

Saturday, June 30, 2012

Maybe we should just give the presidency to

whomever can raise the most money

and just be done with it.

-- Shoebox.com --

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Well, we've had our second "boil water" advisory in two weeks.  Welcome to NJ.  Three mains collapsed, and it will take weeks to repair them, so no outdoor water (gardens, lawns, car washing) until then.  I'm beginning to miss the extremely hard, silty, smelly and bad tasting well water at the country house.  It was at least dependable, always there. And relatively free.

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The usual people are screaming about the Supreme Court approving the Patient Protection and Affordable Health Care Act (PPACA).  The government site for information on the law is at http://www.healthcare.gov/law/index.html.  There's an excellent brief and clear synopsis at http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/vb8vs/eli5_what_exactly_is_obamacare_and_what_did_it/c530lfx, which I highly recommend.

Somebody did a poll where they asked people if they approved of it or not.  If the respondent said no, the pollsters then asked if they approved of each of the individual parts, and they found that almost all of them liked almost all of the pieces of the law.   That doesn't make any sense.

Conservatives want to gut the mandate part.  Oddly, they want to keep the "no refusal for pre-existing conditions" part.  Do they really not understand that you can't have one without the other?  Otherwise, people simply won't get insurance at all until they get some catastrophic condition, THEN they'll buy insurance.  That won't work, fellas.  Premiums for all of us would be astronomical. 

Buncha idiots!

The governor of LA says LA will "defy the federal government" and refuse to implement the law.  Apparently he's unaware that any state can do anything they want as long as they achieve the goals of the law, which is lower costs and full coverage.

What leaves me spinning is that conservative types like to think of themselves as having family-oriented and Christian values, while they think liberals are immoral family-destroying godless atheists.  Or something.  But, uh, isn't taking care of your neighbors a Christian value?  And who is more likely to do that?

Contrary to what the talking heads tell us, Canadians and Brits seem quite happy with their health care systems.  When did "socialize" become a dirty word?  Why is "profit" such a wonderful word?  As Dr. Phil would ask, "How's that workin' for ya?"

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I went to the country house mid-week, so there was a lot of listening to the car radio.  Some woman is all ticked off about the rash of female stars appearing in magazines without makeup.  She points out that they all have perfect lighting, perfect hair, perfect tans, and "some work done".  Now here's the part that had me screaming.  She says that all women need makeup to look good, and to pretend otherwise is trashing womanhood.

She's NUTS!

If anything, SAYING that all women need makeup to look good is trashing womanhood!

(Yeah.  I'm yelling.)

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If you're trying to lose weight, substituting "pure natural" cane sugar or honey for high fructose corn syrup isn't going to help.  It's all sugar!  Sugar sugar sugar!  Empty calories.
a) "pure" or "natural" is irrelevant when it comes to gaining or losing weight.
b) a calorie is a calorie.
c) sugar cane and corn cane are related.  Corn syrup is used in processed foods because it's cheaper, that's all.
d) if you don't know how many calories were in what you just ate or drank, it's cheating to consider it zero.

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What's with all the catheters?  Every public bathroom I've used in the past two years has had used urinary catherers in the sanitary bins in the stalls, or worse, on the floor, and especially restrooms in nightclubs frequented by younger women.  Is there some kind of silent epidemic going on?  I don't understand?  Why do so many young women use them?  I just don't get it.

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An Albany area TV station has an ASL (sign language) interpreter in a small box on the lower right of the screen for all newscasts.  Which is a nice idea.  But!  They also always broadcast a station identifier overlay. On the lower right corner of the screen.  Over the interpreter.  You can see that the interpreter is there, but you can't see her hands.

Has no one from the station ever noticed?  Or don't they care?
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